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He began to took more like Napoleon 



SIXES 

AND SEVENS 



BY 

O. HENRY 

Author of "The Four Million," "The Voice of the 

City," "The Trimmed Lamp," "Strictly 

Business," "Whirligigs." 




PUBLISHED BY 

DOTJBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 

FOB 

REVIEW OF REVIEWS CO. 
1913 



ALL EIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION 
INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN 



COPYRIGHT, ign, BY DOUBLEDAY, PAGE k COMPANY 



COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY STREET & SMITH 

COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY ESS ESS PUBLISHING COMPANY 

COPYRIGHT, IQ03, 1904, BY PRESS PUBLISHING COMPANY 

COPYRIGHT, 1904, BY S. S. MCCLURE COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT, 1904. BY MILLER PUBLISHING COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT, 1899, 1903, 1904, BY FRANK A. MUNSEY COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT, 1904, IglO, BY INTERNATIONAL MAGAZINE COMPANY 

COPYRIGHT, 1907, BY BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY 
COPYRIGHT, I9O8, 1910, BY THE RIDGWAY COMPANY 



CONTENTS 

PACK 

I. THE LAST OF THE TROUBADOURS ... 9 

II. THE SLEUTHS 21 

III. WITCHES' LOAVES 32 

IV. THE PRIDE OF THE CITIES 38 

V. HOLDING UP A TRAIN 46 

VI. ULYSSES AND THE^DOGMAN ..... 64 

V II THE CHAMPION OF THE WEATHER ... 74 

VIII. MAKES THE WHOLE WORLD KIN ... 81 

IX. AT ARMS WITH MORPHEUS 88 

X. THE GHOST OF A CHANCE 95 

XI. JIMMIE HAYES AND MURIEL 108 

XII. THE DOOR OF UNREST 117 

XIII. THE DUPLICITY OF HARGRAVES . . . . 133 

XIV. LET ME FEEL YOUR PULSE 154 

XV. OCTOBER AND JUNE 174 

XVI. THE CHURCH WITH AN OVERSHOT WHEEL . 178 

XVII. NEW YORK BY CAMPFIRE LIGHT . . . . 197 

XVIII. THE ADVENTURES OF SHAMROCK JOLNES . 204 

XIX. THE LADY HIGHER UP 214 

XX. THE GREATER CONEY . 220 



CONTENTS 

XXI. LAW AND ORDER 227 

XXII. TRANSFORMATION OF MARTIN BURNET . . 250 

XXIII. THE CALIPH AND THE CAD 258 

XXIV. THE DIAMOND OF KALI 265 

XXV. THE DAY WE CELEBRATE . 275 



SIXES AND SEVENS 



THE LAST OF THE TROUBADOURS 

INEXORABLY Sam Galloway saddled his pony. 
He was going away from the Rancho Altito at the 
end of a three-months' visit . It is not to be expected 
that a guest should put up with wheat coffee and 
biscuits yellow-streaked with saleratus for longer 
than that. Nick Napoleon, the big Negro man cook, 
had never been able to make good biscuits: Once 
before, when Nick was cooking at the Willow Ranch, 
Sam had been forced to fly from his cuisine, after 
only a six-weeks' sojourn. 

On Sam's face was an expression of sorrow, deepened 
with regret and slightly tempered by the patient 
forgiveness of a connoisseur who cannot be understood . 
But very firmly and inexorably he buckled his saddle- 
cinches, looped his stake-rope and hung it to his 
saddle-horn, tied his slicker and coat on the cantle, 
and looped his quirt on his right wrist. The Merry- 
dews (householders of the Rancho Altito), men, 
women, children, and servants, vassals, visitors, em- 
ployes, dogs, and casual callers were grouped in the 
" gallery " of the ranch house, all with faces set to 

3 



4 Sixes and Sevens 

the tune of melancholy and grief. For, as the coming 
of Sam Galloway to any ranch, camp, or cabin between 
the rivers Frio or Bravo del Norte aroused joy, so 
his departure caused mourning and distress. 

And then, during absolute silence, except for the 
bumping of a hind elbow of a hound dog as he pursued 
a wicked flea, Sam tenderly and carefully tied his 
guitar across his saddle on top of his slicker and coat. 
The guitar was in a green duck bag; and if you catch 
the significance of it, it explains Sam. 

Sam Galloway was the Last of the Troubadours. 
Of course you know about the troubadours. The 
encyclopaedia says they flourished between the eleventh 
and the thirteenth centuries. What they flourished 
doesn't seem clear you may be pretty sure it wasn't 
a sword: maybe it was a fiddlebow, or a forkful of 
spaghetti, or a lady's scarf. Anyhow, Sam Galloway 
was one of 'em. 

Sam put on a martyred expression as he mounted 
his pony. But the expression on his face was hilarious 
compared with the one on his pony's. You see, a 
pony gets to know his rider mighty well, and it is 
not unlikely that cow ponies in pastures and at hitching 
racks had often guyed Sam's pony for being ridden by 
a guitar player instead of by a rollicking, cussing, 
all-wool cowboy. No man is a hero to his saddle- 
horse. And even an escalator in a department store 
might be excused for tripping up a troubadour. 



The Last of the Troubadours 5 

Oh, I know I'm one; and so are you. You remember 
the stories you memorize and the card tricks you 
study and that little piece on the piano how does 
it go? ti-tum-te-tum-ti-tum those little Arabian 
Ten Minute Entertainments that you furnish when 
you go up to call on your rich Aunt Jane. You should 
know that omnce personoe in tres paries divisce sunt 
Namely: Barons, Troubadours, and Workers. Barons 
have no inclination to read such folderol as this; and 
Workers have no time: so I know you must be a 
Troubadour, and that you will understand Sam Gallo- 
way. Whether we sing, act, dance, write, lecture, 
or paint, we are only troubadours; so let us make 
the worst of it. 

The pony with the Dante Alighieri face, guided by 
the pressure of Sam's knees, bore that wandering 
minstrel sixteen miles southeastward. Nature was 
in her most benignant mood. League after league 
of delicate, sweet flowerets made fragrant the gently 
undulating prairie. The east wind tempered the 
spring warmth; wool-white clouds flying in from 
the Mexican Gulf hindered the direct rays of the April 
sun. Sam sang songs as he rode. Under his pony's 
bridle he had tucked some sprigs of chaparral to keep 
away the deer flies. Thus crowned, the long-faced 
quadruped looked more Dantesque than before, and, 
judging by his countenance, seemed to think of 
Beatrice. 



6 Sixes and Sevens 

Straight as topography permitted, Sara rode to 
the sheep ranch of old man Ellison. A visit to a sheep 
ranch seemed to him desirable just then. There had 
been too many people, too much noise, argument, 
competition, confusion, at Rancho Altito. He had 
never conferred upon old man Ellison the favour of 
sojourning at his ranch; but he knew he would be 
welcome. The troubadour is his own passport every- 
where. The Workers in the castle let down the 
drawbridge to him, and the Baron sets him at his left 
hand at table in the banquet hall. There ladies smile 
upon him and applaud his songs and stories, while 
the Workers bring boars' heads and flagons. If the 
Baron nods once or twice in his carved oaken chair, 
he does not do it maliciously. 

Old man Ellison welcomed the troubadour flatter- 
ingly. He had often heard praises of Sam Galloway 
from other ranchmen who had been complimented by 
his visits, but had never aspired to such an honour 
for his own humble barony. I say barony because 
old man Ellison was the Last of the Barons. Of 
course, Mr. Bulwer-Lytton lived too early to know 
him, or he wouldn't have conferred that sobriquet 
upon Warwick. In life it is the duty and the function 
of the Baron to provide work for the Workers and 
lodging and shelter for the Troubadours. 

Old man Ellison was a shrunken old man, with a 
short, yellow-white beard and a face lined and seamed 



The Last of the Troubadours 7 

by past-and-gone smiles. His ranch was a little 
two-room box house in a grove of hackberry trees in 
the lonesomest part of the sheep country. His house- 
hold consisted of a Kiowa Indian man cook, four 
hounds, a pet sheep, and a half-tamed coyote chained 
to a fence-post. He owned 3,000 sheep, which he 
ran on two sections of leased land and many thousands 
of acres neither leased nor owned. Three or four times 
a year some one who spoke his language would ride 
up to his gate and exchange a few bald ideas with 
him. Those were red-letter days to old man Ellison. 
Then in what illuminated, embossed, and gorgeously 
decorated capitals must have been written the day 
on which a troubadour a troubadour who, according 
to the encyclopaedia, should have flourished between 
the eleventh and the thirteenth centuries drew 
rein at the gates of his baronial castle! 

Old man Ellison's smiles came back and filled his 
wrinkles when he saw Sam. He hurried out of the 
house in his shuffling, limping way to greet him. 

"Hello, Mr. Ellison," called Sam cheerfully. 
"Thought I'd drop over and see you, a while. Notice 
you've had fine rains on your range. They ought 
to make good grazing for your spring lambs." 

"Well, well, well," said old man Ellison. "I'm 
mighty glad to see you, Sam. I never thought you'd 
take the trouble to ride over to as out-of-the-way an 
old ranch as this. But you're mighty welcome. 'Light. 



8 Sixes and Sevens 

I've got a sack of new oats in the kitchen shall I 
bring out a feed for your hoss?" 

"Oats for him?" said Sam, derisively. "No, sir-ee. 
He's as fat as a pig now on grass. He don't get rode 
enough to keep him in condition. I'll just turn him 
in the horse pasture with a drag rope on if you don't 
mind." 

I am positive that never during the eleventh and 
thirteenth centuries did Baron, Troubadour, and 
Worker amalgamate as harmoniously as their parallels 
did that evening at old man Ellison's sheep ranch. 
The Kiowa's biscuits were light and tasty and his 
coffee strong. Ineradicable hospitality and appre- 
ciation glowed on old man Ellison's weather- tanned 
face. As for the troubadour, he said to himself that 
he had stumbled upon pleasant places indeed. A well- 
cooked, abundant meal, a host whom his lightest 
attempt to entertain seemed to delight far beyond 
the merits of the exertion, and the reposeful atmos- 
phere that his sensitive soul at that time craved united 
to confer upon him a satisfaction and luxurious ease 
that he had seldom found on his tours of the ranches. 

After the delectable supper, Sam untied the green 
duck bag and took out his guitar. Not by way of pay- 
ment, mind you neither Sam Galloway nor any other 
of the true troubadours are lineal descendants of the 
late Tommy Tucker. You have read of Tommy 
Tucker in the works of the esteemed but often ob- 



The Last of the Troubadours 9 

scure Mother Goose. Tommy Tucker sang for his 
supper. No true troubadour would do that. He 
would have his supper, and then sing for Art's sake. 

Sam Galloway's repertoire comprised about fifty 
funny stories and between thirty and forty songs. 
He by no means stopped there. He could talk through 
twenty cigarettes on any topic that you brought up. 
And he never sat up when he could lie down; and 
never stood when he could sit. I am strongly disposed 
to linger with him, for I am drawing a portrait as 
well as a blunt pencil and a tattered thesaurus will 
allow. 

I wish you could have seen him: he was small and 
tough and inactive beyond the power of imagination 
to conceive. He wore an ultramarine-blue woollen 
shirt laced down the front with a pearl-gray, exag- 
gerated sort of shoestring, indestructible brown duck 
clothes, inevitable high-heeled boots with Mexican 
spurs, and a Mexican straw sombrero. 

That evening Sam and old man Ellison dragged 
their chairs out under the hackberry trees. They 
lighted cigarettes; and the troubadour gaily touched 
his guitar. Many of the songs he sang were the 
weird, melancholy, minor-keyed canciones that he 
had learned from the Mexican sheep herders and 
vaqueros. One, in particular, charmed and soothed 
the soul of the lonely baron. It was a favourite song 
of the sheep herders, beginning: "Huile, huile, 



10 Sixes and Sevens 

palomita," which being translated means, "Fly, fly, 
little dove." Sam sang it for old man Ellison many 
times that evening. 

The troubadour stayed on at the old man's ranch. 
There was peace and quiet and appreciation there, 
such as he had not found in the noisy camps of the 
cattle kings. No audience in the world could have 
crowned the work of poet, musician, or artist with 
more worshipful and unflagging approval than that 
bestowed upon his efforts by old man Ellison. No 
visit by a royal personage to a humble woodchopper 
or peasant could have been received with more flatter- 
ing thankfulness and joy. 

On a cool, canvas-covered cot in the shade of the 
hackberry trees Sam Galloway passed the greater 
part of his time. There he rolled his brown paper 
cigarettes, read such tedious literature as the ranch 
afforded, and added to his repertoire of improvisations 
that he played so expertly on his guitar. To him, as 
a slave ministering to a great lord, the Kiowa brought 
cool water from the red jar hanging under the brush 
shelter, and food when he called for it. The prairie 
zephyrs fanned him mildly; mocking-birds at morn 
and eve competed with but scarce equalled the sweet 
melodies of his lyre; a perfumed stillness seemed to 
fill all his world. While old man Ellison was pottering 
among his flocks of sheep on his mile-an-hour pony, 
and while the Kiowa took his siesta in the burning 



The Last of the Troubadours 11 

sunshine at the end of the kitchen, Sam would lie 
on his cot thinking what a happy world he lived in, 
and how kind it is to the ones whose mission in life 
it is to give entertainment and pleasure. Here 
he had food and lodging as good as he had ever longed 
for; absolute immunity from care or exertion or 
strife; an endless welcome, and a host whose delight 
at the sixteenth repetition of a song or a story was as 
keen as at its initial giving. Was there ever a trouba- 
dour of old who struck upon as royal a castle in his 
wanderings? While he lay thus, meditating upon 
his blessings, little brown cottontails would shyly 
frolic through the yard; a covey of white-topknotted 
blue quail would run past, in single file, twenty yards 
away; a paisano bird, out hunting for tarantulas, 
would hop upon the fence and salute him with sweeping 
flourishes of its long tail. In the eighty-acre horse 
pasture the pony with the Dantesque face grew fat 
and almost smiling. The troubadour was at the end 
of his wanderings. 

Old man Ellison was his own vaciero. That means 
that he supplied his sheep camps with wood, water, 
and rations by his own labours instead of hiring a 
vaciero. On small ranches it is often done. 

One morning he started for the camp of Incarnacion 
Felipe de la Cruz y Monte Piedras (one of his sheep 
herders) with the week's usual rations of brown beans, 
coffee, meal, and sugar. Two miles away on the trail 



12 Sixes and Sevens 

from old Fort Ewing he met, face to face, a terrible 
being called King James, mounted on a fiery, prancing, 
Kentucky-bred horse. 

King James's real name was James King; but 
people reversed it because it seemed to fit him better, 
and also because it seemed to please his majesty. 
King James was the biggest cattleman between the 
Alamo plaza in San Antone and Bill Hopper's saloon 
in Brownsville. Also he was the loudest and most 
offensive bully and braggart and bad man in southwest 
Texas. And he always made good whenever he 
bragged; and the more noise he made the more dan- 
gerous he was. In the story papers it is always the 
quiet, mild-mannered man with light blue eyes and 
a low voice who turns out to be really dangerous; 
but in real life and in this story such is not the case. 
Give me my choice between assaulting a large, loud- 
mouthed rough-houser and an inoffensive stranger 
with blue eyes sitting quietly in a corner, and you will 
see something doing in the corner every time. 

King James, as I intended to say earlier, was a 
fierce, two-hundred-pound, sunburned, blond man, 
as pink as an October strawberry, and with two hori- 
zontal slits under shaggy red eyebrows for eyes. On 
that day he wore a flannel shirt that was tan-coloured, 
with the exception of certain large areas which were 
darkened by transudations due to the summer sun. 
There seemed to be other clothing and garnishings 



The Last of the Troubadours 13 

about him, such as brown duck trousers stuffed into 
immense boots, and red handkerchiefs and revolvers; 
and a shotgun laid across his saddle and a leather 
belt with millions of cartridges shining in it but 
your mind skidded off such accessories; what held 
your gaze was just the two little horizontal slits that 
he used for eyes. 

This was the man that old man Ellison met on the 
trail; and when you count up in the baron's favour 
that he was sixty-five and weighed ninety-eight 
pounds and had heard of King James's record and 
that he (the baron) had a hankering for the vita 
simplex and had no gun with him and wouldn't have 
used it if he had, you can't censure him if I tell you 
that the smiles with which the troubadour had filled 
his wrinkles went out of them and left them plain 
wrinkles again. But he was not the kind of baron 
that flies from danger. He reined in the mile-an-hour 
pony (no difficult feat), and saluted the formidable 
monarch. 

King James expressed himself with royal directness. 

"You're that old snoozer that's running sheep on 
this range, ain't you? " said he. " What right have you 
got to do it? Do you own any land, or lease any?" 

"I have two sections leased from the state," said 
old man Ellison, mildly. 

"Not by no means you haven't," said King James. 
"Your lease expired yesterday; and I had a man at 



14 Sixes and Sevens 

the land office on the minute to take it up. You 
don't control a foot of grass in Texas. You sheep 
men have got to git. Your time's up. It's a cattle 
country, and there ain't any room in it for snoozers. 
This range you've got your sheep on is mine. I'm 
putting up a wire fence, forty by sixty miles; and if 
there's a sheep inside of it when it's done it'll be a 
dead one. I'll give you a week to move yours away. 
If they ain't gone by then, I'll send six men over here 
with Winchesters to make mutton out of the whole 
lot. And if I find you here at the same time this is 
what you'll get." 

King James patted the breech of his shot-gun 
warningly. 

Old man Ellison rode on to the camp of Incarnacion. 
He sighed many times, and the wrinkles in his face 
grew deeper. Rumours that the old order was about 
to change had reached him before. The end of Free 
Grass was in sight. Other troubles, too, had been 
accumulating upon his shoulders. His flocks were 
decreasing instead of growing; the price of wool 
was declining at every clip; even Bradshaw, the 
storekeeper at Frio City, at whose store he bought 
his ranch supplies, was dunning him for his last six 
months' bill and threatening to cut him off. And 
so this last greatest calamity suddenly dealt out to 
him by the terrible King James was a crusher. 

When the old man got back to the ranch at sunset 



15 

he found Sam Galloway lying on his cot, propped 
against a roll of blankets and wool sacks, fingering 
his guitar. 

"Hello, Uncle Ben," the troubadour called, cheer- 
fully. "You rolled in early this evening. I been 
trying a new twist on the Spanish Fandango to-day. 
I just about got it. Here's how she goes listen." 

"That's fine, that's mighty fine," said old man 
Ellison, sitting on the kitchen step and rubbing his 
white, Scotch-terrier whiskers. "I reckon you've 
got all the musicians beat east and west, Sam, as far 
as the roads are cut out." 

"Oh, I don't know," said Sam, reflectively. "But 
I certainly do get there on variations. I guess I 
can handle anything in five flats about as well as any 
of 'em. But you look kind of fagged out, Uncle 
Ben ain't you feeling right well this evening?" 

"Little tired; that's all, Sam. If you ain't played 
yourself out, let's have that Mexican piece that 
starts off with: 'Huile, huile, palomita.' It seems 
that that song always kind of soothes and comforts 
me after I've been riding far or anything bothers me." 

"Why, seguramente, senor," said Sam. "I'll hit 
her up for you as often as you like. And before I 
forget about it, Uncle Ben, you want to jerk Bradshaw 
up about them last hams he sent us. They're just 
a little bit strong." 

A man sixty-five years old, living on a sheep ranch 



16 Sixes and Sevens 

and beset by a complication of disasters, cannot 
successfully and continuously dissemble. Moreover, 
a troubadour has eyes quick to see unhappiness in 
others around him because it disturbs his own 
ease. So, on the next day, Sam again questioned the 
old man about his air of sadness and abstraction. 
Then old man Ellison told him the story of King 
James's threats and orders and that pale melancholy 
and red ruin appeared to have marked him for their 
own. The troubadour took the news thoughtfully. 
He had heard much about King James. 

On the third day of the seven days of grace allowed 
him by the autocrat of the range, old man Ellison 
drove his buckboard to Frio City to fetch some neces- 
sary supplies for the ranch. Bradshaw was hard 
but not implacable. He divided the old man's order 
by two, and let him have a little more time. One 
article secured was a new, fine ham for the pleasure 
of the troubadour. 

Five miles out of Frio City on his way home the 
old man met King James riding into town. His 
majesty could never look anything but fierce and 
menacing, but to-day his slits of eyes appeared to be 
a little wider than they usually were. 

" Good day," said the king, gruffly. " I've been want- 
ing to see you. I hear it said by a cowman from Sandy 
yesterday that you was from Jackson County, Mississ- 
ippi, originally. I want to know if that's a fact" 



The Last of the Troubadours 17 

"Born there," said old man Ellison, "and raised 
there till I was twenty-one." 

"This man says," went on King James, "that he 
thinks you was related to the Jackson County Reeveses. 
Was he right?" 

"Aunt Caroline Reeves," said the old man, "was 
my half-sister." 

"She was my aunt," said King James. "I run 
away from home when I was sixteen. Now, let's 
re-talk over some things that we discussed a few days 
ago. They call me a bad man; and they're only 
half right. There's plenty of room in my pasture 
for your bunch of sheep and their increase for a long 
time to come. Aunt Caroline used to cut out sheep 
in cake dough and bake 'em for me. You keep your 
sheep where they are, and use all the range you want. 
How's your finances?" 

The old man related his woes in detail, dignifiedly, 
with restraint and candour. 

"She used to smuggle extra grub into my school 
basket I'm speaking of Aunt Caroline," said King 
James. "I'm going over to Frio City to-day, and 
I'll ride back by your ranch to-morrow. I'll draw 
$2,000 out of the bank there and bring it over to you; 
and I'll tell Bradshaw to let you have everything you 
want on credit. You are bound to have heard the 
old saying at home, that the Jackson County Reeveses 
and Kings would stick closer by each other than 



18 Sixes and Sevens 

chestnut burrs. Well, I'm a King yet whenever I 
run across a Reeves. So you look out for me along 
about sundown to-morrow, and don't worry about 
nothing. Shouldn't wonder if the dry spell don't 
kill out the young grass." 

Old man Ellison drove happily ranch ward. Once 
more the smiles filled out his wrinkles. Very suddenly, 
by the magic of kinship and the good that lies some- 
where in all hearts, his troubles had been removed. 

On reaching the ranch he found that Sain Galloway 
was not there. His guitar hung by its buckskin string 
to a hackberry limb, moaning as the gulf breeze blew 
across its masterless strings. 

The Kiowa endeavoured to explain. 

"Sam, he catch pony," said he, "and say he ride 
to Frio City. What for no can damn sabe. Say 
he come back to-night. Maybe so. That all." 

As the first stars came out the troubadour 
rode back to his haven. He pastured his pony 
and went into the house, his spurs jingling mar- 
tially. 

Old man Ellison sat at the kitchen table, having 
a tin cup of bef ore-supper coffee. He looked contented 
and pleased. 

"Hello, Sam," said he. "I'm darned glad to see ye 
back. I don't know how I managed to get along on 
this ranch, anyhow, before ye dropped in to cheer 
things up. I'll bet ye've been skylarking around 



The Last of the Troubadours 19 

with some of them Frio City gals, now, that's kept 
ye so late." 

And then old man Ellison took another look at 
Sam's face and saw that the minstrel had changed 
to the man of action. 

And while Sam is unbuckling from his waist old 
man Ellison's six-shooter, that the latter had left 
behind when he drove to town, we may well pause 
to remark that anywhere and whenever a troubadour 
lays down the guitar and takes up the sword trouble 
is sure to follow. It is not the expert thrust of Athos 
nor the cold skill of Aramis nor the iron wrist of 
Porthos that we have to fear it is the Gascon's 
fury the wild and unacademic attack of the trouba- 
dour the sword of D'Artagnan. 

"I done it," said Sam. "I went over to Frio City 
to do it. I couldn't let him put the skibunk on you, 
Uncle Ben. I met him in Summers's saloon. I 
knowed what to do. I said a few things to him that 
nobody else heard. He reached for his gun first 
half a dozen fellows saw him do it but I got mine 
unlimbered first. Three doses I gave him right 
around the lungs, and a saucer could have covered 
up all of 'em. He won't bother you no more." 

"This is King James you speak of? " 
asked old man Ellison, while he sipped his coffee. 

"You bet it was. And they took me before the 
county judge; and the witnesses what saw him draw 



20 Sixes and Sevens 

his gun first was all there. Well, of course, they put 
me under $300 bond to appear before the court, but 
there was four or five boys on the spot ready to sign 
the bail. He won't bother you no more, Uncle Ben. 
You ought to have seen how close them bullet holes 
was together. I reckon playing a guitar as much as 
I do must kind of limber a fellow's trigger finger up a 
little, don't you think, Uncle Ben? " 

Then there was a little silence in the castle except 
for the spluttering of a venison steak that the Kiowa 
was cooking. 

"Sam," said old man Ellison, stroking his white 
whiskers with a tremulous hand, "would you mind 
getting the guitar and playing that 'Hutie, huile, 
palomita' piece once or twice? It always seems to 
be kind of soothing and comforting when a man's 
tired and fagged out." 

There is no more to be said, except that the title 
of the story is wrong. It should have been called 
"The Last of the Barons." There never will be an 
end to the troubadours; and now and then it does 
seem that the jingle of their guitars will drown the 
sound of the muffled blows of the pickaxes and trip 
hammers of all the Workers in the world. 



n 

THE SLEUTHS 

IN THE Big City a man will disappear with the 
suddenness and completeness of the flame of a candle 
that is blown out. All the agencies of inquisition 
the hounds of the trail, the sleuths of the city's laby- 
rinths, the closet detectives of theory and induction 
will be invoked to the search. Most often the 
man's face will be seen no more. Sometimes he 
will reappear in Sheboygan or in the wilds of Terre 
Haute, calling himself one of the synonyms of "Smith," 
and without memory of events up to a certain time, 
including his grocer's bill. Sometimes it will be 
found, after dragging the rivers, and polling the res- 
taurants to see if he may be waiting for a well-done 
sirloin, that he has moved next door. 

This snuffing out of a human being like the erasure 
of a chalk man from a blackboard is one of the most 
impressive themes in dramaturgy. 

The case of Mary Snyder, in point, should not be 
without interest. 

A man of middle age, of the name of Meeks, came 
from the West to New York to find his sister, Mrs. 

21 



22 Sixes and Sevens 

Mary Snyder, a widow, aged fifty-two, who had been 
living for a year in a tenement house in a crowded 
neighbourhood. 

At her address he was told that Mary Snyder had 
moved away longer than a month before. No one 
could tell him her new address. 

On coming out Mr. Meeks addressed a policeman 
who was standing on the corner, and explained his 
dilemma. 

"My sister is very poor," he said, "and I am 
anxious to find her. I have recently made quite a 
lot of money in a lead mine, and I want her to share my 
prosperity. There is no use in advertising her, be- 
cause she cannot read." 

The policeman pulled his moustache and looked 
so thoughtful and mighty that Meeks could almost 
feel the joyful tears of his sister Mary dropping upon 
his bright blue tie. 

"You go down in the Canal Street neighbourhood," 
said the policeman, "and get a job drivin' the biggest 
dray you can find. There's old women always gettin* 
knocked over by drays down there. You might see 
'er among 'em. If you don't want to do that you 
better go 'round to headquarters and get 'em to put 
a fly cop onto the dame." 

At police headquarters, Meeks received ready 
assistance. A general alarm was sent out, and copies 
of a photograph of Mary Snyder that her brother had 



The Sleuths 23 

were distributed among the stations. In Mulberry 
Street the chief assigned Detective Mullins to the case. 

The detective took Meeks aside and said: 

"This is not a very difficult case to unravel. Shave 
off your whiskers, fill your pockets with good cigars, 
and meet me in the cafe of the Waldorf at three 
o'clock this afternoon." 

* Meeks obeyed. He found Mullins there. They 
had a bottle of wine, while the detective asked ques- 
tions concerning the missing woman. 

"Now," said Mullins, "New York is a big city, 
but we've got the detective business systematized. 
There are two ways we can go about finding your 
sister. We will try one of 'em first. You say she's 
fifty-two?" 

"A little past," said Meeks. 

The detective conducted the Westerner to a branch 
advertising office of one of the largest dailies. There 
he wrote the following "ad" and submitted it to 
Meeks : 

"Wanted, at once one hundred attractive chorus 
girls for a new musical comedy. Apply all day at 
No. Broadway." 

Meeks was indignant. 

"My sister," said he, "is a poor, hard-working, 
elderly woman. I do not see what aid an advertise- 
ment of this kind would be toward finding her." 

"All right," said the detective. "I guess you 



24 Sixes and Sevens 

don't know New York. But if you've got a grouch 
against this scheme we'll try the other one. It's 
a sure thing. But it'll cost you more." 

"Never mind the expense," said Meeks; "we'll 
try it." 

The sleuth led him back to the Waldorf. "Engage 
a couple of bedrooms and a parlour," he advised, 
"and let's go up." 

This was done, and the two were shown to a superb 
suite on the fourth floor. Meeks looked puzzled. 
The detective sank into a velvet armchair, and pulled 
out his cigar case. 

"I forgot to suggest, old man," he said, "that you 
should have taken the rooms by the month. They 
wouldn't have stuck you so much for 'em." 

"By the month!" exclaimed Meeks. "What do 
you mean?" 

"Oh, it'll take time to work the game this way. 
I told you it would cost you more. We'll have to 
wait till spring. There'll be a new city directory out 
then. Very likely your sister's name and address 
will be in it." 

Meeks rid himself of the city detective at once. 
On the next day some one advised him to consult 
Shamrock Jolnes, New York's famous private detec- 
tive, who demanded fabulous fees, but performed 
miracles in the way of solving mysteries and crimes. 

After waiting for two hours in the anteroom of 



The Sleuths 25 

the great detective's apartment, Meeks was shown into 
his presence. Jolnes sat in a purple dressing-gown at 
an inlaid ivory chess table, with a magazine before him, 
trying to solve the mystery of "They." The famous 
sleuth's thin, intellectual face, piercing eyes, and rate 
per word are too well known to need description. 

Meeks set forth his errand. " My fee, if successful, 
will be $500," said Shamrock Jolnes. 

Meeks bowed his agreement to the price. 

"I will undertake your case, Mr. Meeks," said 
Jolnes, finally. "The disappearance of people in this 
city has always been an interesting problem to me. I 
remember a case that I brought to a successful outcome 
a year ago. A family bearing the name of Clark dis- 
appeared suddenly from a small flat in which they 
were living. I watched the flat building for two 
months for a clue. One day it struck me that a certain 
milkman and a grocer's boy always walked backward 
when they carried their wares upstairs. Following 
out by induction the idea that this observation gave 
me, I at once located the missing family. They had 
moved into the flat across the hall and changed their 
name to Kralc." 

Shamrock Jolnes and his client went to the tene- 
ment house where Mary Snyder had lived, and the 
detective demanded to be shown the room in which 
she had lived. It had been occupied by no tenant 
since her disappearance. 



26 Sixes and Sevens 

The room was small, dingy, and poorly furnished. 
Meeks seated himself dejectedly on a broken chair, 
while the great detective searched the walls and floor 
and the few sticks of old, rickety furniture for a clue. 

At the end of half an hour Jolnes had collected 
a few seemingly unintelligible articles a cheap 
black hat pin, a piece torn off a theatre programme, 
and the end of a small torn card on which was the word 
"left" and the characters "C 12." 

Shamrock Jolnes leaned against the mantel for ten 
minutes, with his head resting upon his hand, and 
an absorbed look upon his intellectual face. At the 
end of that time he exclaimed, with animation: 

"Come, Mr. Meeks; the problem is solved. I can 
take you directly to the house where your sister is 
living. And you may have no fears concerning her 
welfare, for she is amply provided with funds for 
the present at least." 

Meeks felt joy and wonder in equal proportions. 

"How did you manage it?" he asked, with admira- 
tion in his tones. 

Perhaps Jolnes's only weakness was a professional 
pride in his wonderful achievements in induction. 
He was ever ready to astound and charm his listeners 
by describing his methods. 

"By elimination," said Jolnes, spreading his clues 
upon a little table, "I got rid of certain parts of the 
city to which Mrs. Snyder might have removed. You 



The Sleuths 27 

see this hatpin? That eliminates Brooklyn. No 
woman attempts to board a car at the Brooklyn 
Bridge without being sure that she carries a hatpin 
with which to fight her way into a seat. And now I 
will demonstrate to you that she could not have gone 
to Harlem. Behind this door are two hooks in the 
wall. Upon one of these Mrs. Snyder has hung her 
bonnet, and upon the other her shawl. You will 
observe that the bottom of the hanging shawl has 
gradually made a soiled streak against the plastered 
wall. The mark is clean-cut, proving that there is 
no fringe on the shawl. Now, was there ever a case 
where a middle-aged woman, wearing a shawl, boarded 
a Harlem train without there being a fringe on the 
shawl to catch in the gate and delay the passengers 
behind her? So we eliminate Harlem. 

"Therefore I conclude that Mrs. Snyder has not 
moved very far away. On this torn, piece of card 
you see the word "Left," the letter "C," and the 
number "12." Now, I happen to know that No. 12 
Avenue C is a first-class boarding house, far beyond 
your sister's means as we suppose. But then I 
find this piece of a theatre programme, crumpled into 
an odd shape. What meaning does it convey. None 
to you, very likely, Mr. Meeks; but it is eloquent to 
one whose habits and training take cognizance of the 
smallest things. 

"You have told me that your sister was a scrub 



8 Sixes and Severn 

woman. She scrubbed the floors of offices and hall- 
ways. Let us assume that she procured such work to 
perform in a theatre. Where is valuable jewellery lost 
the oftenest, Mr. Meeks? In the theatres, of course. 
Look at that piece of programme, Mr. Meeks. Ob- 
serve the round impression in it. It has been wrapped 
around a ring perhaps a ring of great value. Mrs. 
Snyder found the ring while at work in the theatre. 
She hastily tore off a piece of a programme, wrapped 
the ring carefully, and thrust it into her bosom. The 
next day she disposed of it, and, with her increased 
means, looked about her for a more comfortable place 
in which to live. When I reach thus far in the chain I 
see nothing impossible about No. 12 Avenue C. It 
is there we will find your sister, Mr. Meeks." 

Shamrock Jolnes concluded his convincing speech 
with the smile of a successful artist. Meeks's admir- 
ation was too great for words. Together they went to 
No. 12 Avenue C. It was an old-fashioned brown- 
stone house in a prosperous and respectable neighbour- 
hood. 

They rang the bell, and on inquiring were told 
that no Mrs. Snyder was known there, and that not 
within six months had a new occupant come to the 
house. 

When they reached the sidewalk again, Meeks 
examined the clues which he had brought away from 
his sister's old room. 



The Sleuths 29 

"I am no detective," he remarked to Jolnes as he 
raised the piece of theatre programme to his nose, 
"but it seems to me that instead of a ring having been 
wrapped in this paper it was one of those round pepper- 
mint drops. And this piece with the address on it 
looks to me like the end of a seat coupon No. 12, 
row C, left aisle." 

Shamrock Jolnes had a far-away look in his eyes. 

"I think you would do well to consult Juggins," 
said he. 

"Who is Juggins?" asked Meeks. 

"He is the leader," said Jolnes, "of a new modern 
school of detectives. Their methods are different from 
ours, but it is said that Juggins has solved some ex- 
tremely puzzling cases. I will take you to him." 

They found the greater Juggins in his office. He 
was a small man with light hair, deeply absorbed in 
reading one of the bourgeois works of Nathaniel 
Hawthorne. 

The two great detectives of different schools shook 
hands with ceremony, and Meeks was introduced. 

"State the facts," said Juggins, going on with his 
reading. 

When Meeks ceased, the greater one closed his 
book and said: 

"Do I understand that your sister is fifty-two 
years of age, with a large mole on the side of her nose, 
and that she is a very poor widow, making a scanty 



30 Sixes and Sevens 

living by scrubbing, and with a very homely face and 
figure?" 

"That describes her exactly," admitted Meeks. 
Juggins rose and put on his hat. 

"In fifteen minutes," he said, "I will return, bringing 
you her present address." 

Shamrock Jolnes turned pale, but forced a smile. 

Within the specified time Juggins returned and 
consulted a little slip of paper held in his hand. 

"Your sister, Mary Snyder," he announced calmly, 
"will be found at No. 162 Chilton street. She is 
living in the back hall bedroom, five flights up. The 
house is only four blocks from here," he continued, 
addressing Meeks. "Suppose you go and verify the 
statement and then return here. Mr. Jolnes will 
await you, I dare say." 

Meeks hurried away. In twenty minutes he was 
back again, with a beaming face. 

"She is there and well!" he cried. "Name your 
fee!" 

"Two dollars," said Juggins. 

When Meeks had settled his bill and departed, 
Shamrock Jolnes stood with his hat in his hand before 
Juggins. 

"If it would not be asking too much," he stammered 

" if you would favour me so far would you object 


'Certainly not," said Juggins pleasantly. "I will 



The Sleuths 31 

tell you how I did it. You remember the description 
of Mrs. Snyder? Did you ever know a woman like that 
who wasn't paying weekly instalments on an enlarged 
crayon portrait of herself? The biggest factory of 
that kind in the country is just around the corner. 
I went there and got her address off the books. That's 
all." 



m 

WITCHES' LOAVES 

MlSS MARTHA MEACHAM kept the little bakery 
on the corner (the one where you go up three steps, 
and the bell tinkles when you open the door). 

Miss Martha was forty, her bank-book showed a 
credit of two thousand dollars, and she possessed 
two false teeth and a sympathetic heart. Many 
people have married whose chances to do so were 
much inferior to Miss Martha's. 

Two or three times a week a customer came in in 
whom she began to take an interest. He was a middle- 
aged man, wearing spectacles and a brown beard 
trimmed to a careful point. 

He spoke English with a strong German accent. 
His clothes were worn and darned in places, and 
wrinkled and baggy in others. But he looked neat, 
and had very good manners. 

He always bought two loaves of stale bread. Fresh 
bread was five cents a loaf. Stale ones were two for 
five. Never did he call for anything but stale bread. 

Once Miss Martha saw a red and brown stain on 
his fingers. She was sure then that he was an artist 

32 



Witches' Loaves 33 

and very poor. No doubt he lived in a garret, where 
he painted pictures and ate stale bread and thought 
of the good things to eat in Miss Martha's bakery. 

Often when Miss Martha sat down to her chops and 
light rolls and jam and tea she would sigh, and wish 
that the gentle-mannered artist might share her tasty 
meal instead of eating his dry crust in that draughty 
attic. Miss Martha's heart, as you have been told, 
was a sympathetic one. 

In order to test her theory as to his occupation, 
she brought from her room one day a painting that 
she had bought at a sale, and set it against the shelves 
behind the bread counter. 

It was a Venetian scene. A splendid marble 
palazzio (so it said on the picture) stood in the fore- 
ground or rather forewater. For the rest there 
were gondolas (with the lady trailing her hand in the 
water), clouds, sky, and chiaro-oscuro in plenty. No 
artist could fail to notice it. 

Two days afterward the customer came in. 

"Two loafs of stale bread, if you blease. 

"You haf here a fine bicture,madame,"he said while 
she was wrapping up the bread. 

"Yes?" says Miss Martha, revelling in her own 
cunning. " I do so admire art and' ' (no, it would not 
do to say "artists" thus early) "and paintings," she 
substituted. "You think it is a good picture?" 

"Der balace," said the customer, "is not in good 



34 Sixes and Sevens 

drawing. Der bairspective of it is not true. Goot 
morning, madame." 

He took his bread, bowed, and hurried out. 

Yes, he must be an artist. Miss Martha took the 
picture back to her room. 

How gentle and kindly his eyes shone behind his 
spectacles! What a broad brow he had! To be able 
to judge perspective at a glance and to live on stale 
bread! But genius often has to struggle before it 
is recognized. 

What a thing it would be for art and perspective 
if genius were backed by two thousand dollars in bank, 
a bakery, and a sympathetic heart to But 
these were day-dreams, Miss Martha. 

Often now when he came he would chat for a while 
across the showcase. He seemed to crave Miss 
Martha's cheerful words. 

He kept on buying stale bread. Never a cake, 
never a pie, never one of her delicious Sally Lunns. 

She thought he began to look thinner and dis- 
couraged. Her heart ached to add something good 
to eat to his meagre purchase, but her courage failed at 
the act. She did not dare affront him. She knew 
the pride of artists. 

Miss Martha took to wearing her blue-dotted silk 
waist behind the counter. In the back room she 
cooked a mysterious compound of quince seeds and 
borax. Ever so many people use it for the complexion. 



Witches' Loaves 35 

One day the customer came in as usual, laid his 
nickel on the showcase, and called for his stale loaves. 
While Miss Martha was reaching for them there was 
a great tooting and clanging, and a fire-engine came 
lumbering past. 

The customer hurried to the door to look, as any 
one will. Suddenly inspired, Miss Martha seized 
the opportunity. 

On the bottom shelf behind the counter was a pound 
of fresh butter that the dairyman had left ten minutes 
before. With a bread knife Miss Martha made a 
deep slash in each of the stale loaves, inserted a 
generous quantity of butter, and pressed the loaves 
tight again. 

When the customer turned once more she was tying 
the paper around them. 

When he had gone, after an unusually pleasant little 
chat, Miss Martha smiled to herself, but not without 
a slight fluttering of the heart. 

Had she been too bold? Would he take offense? 
But surely not. There was no language of edibles. 
Butter was no emblem of unmaidenly forwardness. 

For a long time that day her mind dwelt on the 
subject. She imagined the scene when he should 
discover her little deception. 

He would lay down his brushes and palette. There 
would stand his easel with the picture he was painting 
in which the perspective was beyond criticism. 



36 Sixes and Sevens 

He would prepare for his luncheon of dry bread 
and water. He would slice into a loaf ah ! 

Miss Martha blushed. Would he think of the hand 
that placed it there as he ate? Would he 

The front door bell jangled viciously. Somebody 
was coming in, making a great deal of noise. 

Miss Martha hurried to the front. Two men were 
there. One was a young man smoking a pipe a 
man she had never seen before. The other was her 
artist. 

His face was very red, his hat was on the back 
of his head, his hair was wildly rumpled. He clinched 
his two fists and shook them ferociously at Miss 
Martha. At Miss Martha. 

"Dummkopf!" he shouted with extreme loudness; 
and then " Tausendonfer! " or something like it in 
German. 

The young man tried to draw him away. 

"I vill not go," he said angrily, "else I shall told 
her." 

He made a bass drum of Miss Martha's counter. 

"You haf shpoilt me," he cried, his blue eyes blazing 
behind his spectacles. "I vill tell you. You vas von 
meddingsome old cat!" 

Miss Martha leaned weakly against the shelves 
and laid one hand on her blue-dotted silk waist. The 
young man took the other by the collar. 

"Come on," he said, "you've said enough." He 



Witches' Loams 37 

dragged the angry one out at the door to the sidewalk, 
and then came back. 

"Guess you ought to be told, ma'am," he said, 
"what the row is about. That's Blumberger. He's 
an architectural draftsman. I work in the same 
office with him. 

"He's been working hard for three months draw- 
ing a plan for a new city hall. It was a prize 
competition. He finished inking the lines yesterday. 
You know, a draftsman always makes his drawing 
in pencil first. When it's done he rubs out the pencil 
lines with handfuls of stale bread crumbs. That's 
better than India rubber. 

" Blumberger's been buying the bread here. Well, 
to-day well, you know, ma'am, that butter isn't 
well, Blumberger's plan isn't good for anything now 
except to cut up into railroad sandwiches." 

Miss Martha went into the back room. She took 
off the blue-dotted silk waist and put on the old brown 
serge she used to wear. Then she poured the quince 
seed and borax mixture out of the window into the 
ash can. 



IV 

THE PRIDE OF THE CITIES 

oAID Mr. Kipling, "The cities are full of pride, 
challenging each to each." Even so. 

New York was empty. Two hundred thousand 
of its people were away for the summer. Three 
million eight hundred thousand remained as care- 
takers and to pay the bills of the absentees. But 
the two hundred thousand are an expensive lot. 

The New Yorker sat at a roof-garden table, ingest- 
ing solace through a straw. His panama lay upon 
a chair. The July audience was scattered among 
vacant seats as widely as outfielders when the cham- 
pion batter steps to the plate. Vaudeville happened 
at intervals. The breeze was cool from the bay; 
around and above everywhere except on the stage 
were stars. Glimpses were to be had of waiters, 
always disappearing, like startled chamois. Prudent 
visitors who had ordered refreshments by 'phone 
in the morning were now being served. The New 
Yorker was aware of certain drawbacks to his com- 
fort, but content beamed softly from his rimless eye- 
glasses. His family was out of town. The drinks 

38 



The Pride of the Cities 39 

were warm; the ballet was suffering from lack of 
both tune and talcum but his family would not 
return until September. 

Then up into the garden stumbled the man from 
Topaz City, Nevada. The gloom of the solitary sight- 
seer enwrapped him. Bereft of joy through loneliness, 
he stalked with a widower's face through the halls of 
pleasure. Thirst for human companionship possessed 
him as he panted in the metropolitan draught. 
Straight to the New Yorker's table he steered. 

The New Yorker, disarmed and made reckless by 
the lawless atmosphere of a roof garden, decided upon 
utter abandonment of his life's traditions. He re- 
solved to shatter with one rash, dare-devil, impulsive, 
hair-brained act the conventions that had hitherto 
been woven into his existence. Carrying out this 
radical and precipitous inspiration he nodded slightly 
to the stranger as he drew nearer the table. 

The next moment found the man from Topaz City 
in the list of the New Yorker's closest friends. He 
took a chair at the table, he gathered two others for 
his feet, he tossed his broad-brimmed hat upon a 
fourth, and told his life's history to his new-found 
pard. 

The New Yorker warmed a little, as an apartment- 
house furnace warms when the strawberry season 
begins. A waiter who came within hail in an un- 
guarded moment was captured and paroled on an 



40 Sixes and Sevens 

errand to the Doctor Wiley experimental station. The 
ballet was now in the midst of a musical vagary, and 
danced upon the stage programmed as Bolivian peas- 
ants, clothed in some portions of its anatomy as 
Norwegian fisher maidens, in others as ladies-in-waiting 
of Marie Antoinette, historically denuded in other 
portions so as to represent sea nymphs, and present- 
ing the tout ensemble of a social club of Central Park 
West housemaids at a fish fry. 

"Been in the city long?" inquired the New Yorker, 
getting ready the exact tip against the waiter's com- 
ing with large change from the bill. 

"Me?" said the man from Topaz City. "Four 
days. Never in Topaz City, was you?" 

"I!" said the New Yorker. "I was never farther 
west than Eighth Avenue. I had a brother who died 
on Ninth, but I met the cortege at Eighth. There 
was a bunch of violets on the hearse, and the under- 
taker mentioned the incident to avoid mistake. I 
cannot say that I am familiar with the West." 

"Topaz City," said the man who occupied four 
chairs, "is one of the finest towns in the world." 

"I presume that you have seen the sights of the 
metropolis," said the New Yorker. "Four days is 
not a sufficient length of time in which to view even 
our most salient points of interest, but one can pos- 
sibly form a general impression. Our architectural 
supremacy is what generally strikes visitors to our 



The Pride of the Cities 41 

city most forcibly. Of course you have seen our 
Flatiron Building. It is considered " 

"Saw it," said the man from Topaz City. "But 
you ought to come out our way. It's mountainous, 
you know, and the ladies all wear short skirts for 
climbing and " 

"Excuse me," said the New Yorker, "but that isn't 
exactly the point. New York must be a wonderful 
revelation to a visitor from the West. Now, as to 
our hotels " 

"Say," said the man from Topaz City, "that re- 
minds me there were sixteen stage robbers shot last 
year within twenty miles of " 

"I was speaking of hotels," said the New Yorker. 
"We lead Europe in that respect. And as far as our 
leisure class is concerned we are far " 

"Oh, I don't know," interrupted the man from To- 
paz City. "There were twelve tramps in our jail 
when I left home. I guess New York isn't so " 

"Beg pardon, you seem to misapprehend the idea. 
Of course, you visited the Stock Exchange and Wall 
Street, where the " 

"Oh, yes," said the man from Topaz City, as he 
lighted a Pennsylvania stogie, "and I want to tell 
you chat we've got the finest town marshal west of 
the Rockies. Bill Rainer he took in five pickpockets out 
of the crowd when Red Nose Thompson laid the corner- 
stone of his new saloon. Topaz City don't allow " 



42 Sixes and Sevens 

"Have another Rhine wine and seltzer," suggested 
the New Yorker. "I've never been West, as I said; 
but there can't be any place out there to compare 
with New York. As to the claims of Chicago I " 

"One man," said the Topazite "one man only 
has been murdered and robbed in Topaz City in the 
last three ! 

"Oh, I know what Chicago is," interposed the New 
Yorker. "Have you been up Fifth Avenue to see 
the magnificent residences of our mil - 

"Seen 'em all. You ought to know Reub Stegall, 
the assessor of Topaz. When old man Tilbury, that 
owns the only two-story house in town, tried to swear 
his taxes from $6,000 down to $450.75, Reub buckled 
on his forty-five and went down to see " 

"Yes, yes, but speaking of our great city one of 
its greatest features is our superb police department. 
There is no body of men in the world that can equal 
it for " 

"That waiter gets around like a Langley flying ma- 
chine," remarked the man from Topaz City, thirstily. 
"We've got men in our town, too, worth $400,000. 
There's old Bill Withers and Colonel Metcalf and - 

"Have you seen Broadway at night?" asked the 
New Yorker, courteously. "There are few streets 
in the world that can compare with it. When the 
electrics are shining and the pavements are alive 
with two hurrying streams of elegantly clothed 



The Pride of the Cities 43 

men and beautiful women attired in the costliest 
costumes that wind in and out in a close maze of 
expensively " 

"Never knew but one case in Topaz City," said 
the man from the West. "Jim Bailey, our mayor, 
had his watch and chain and $235 in cash taken from 
his pocket while " 

"That's another matter," said the New Yorker. 
"While you are in our city you should avail yourself 
of every opportunity to see its wonders. Our rapid 
transit system " 

"If you was out in Topaz," broke in the man from 
there, "I could show you a whole cemetery full of 
people that got killed accidentally. Talking about 
mangling folks up! why, when Berry Rogers turned 
loose that old double-barrelled shot-gun of his loaded 
with slugs at anybody " 

"Here, waiter!" called the New Yorker. "Two 
more of the same. It is acknowledged by every one 
that our city is the centre of art, and literature, 
and learning. Take, for instance, our after-dinner 
speakers. Where else in the country would you 
find such wit and eloquence as emanate from Depew 
and Ford, and 

"If you take the papers," interrupted the West- 
erner, "you must have read of Pete Webster's daughter. 
The Websters live two blocks north of the court-house 
in Topaz City. Miss Tillie Webster, she slept forty 



44 Sixes and Sevens 

days and nights without waking up. The doctors 
said that " 

"Pass the matches, please," said the New Yorker. 
"Have you observed the expedition with which new 
buildings are being run up in New York? Improved 
inventions in steel framework and " 

"I noticed," said the Nevadian, " that the statistics 
of Topaz City showed only one carpenter crushed by 
falling timbers last year and he was caught in a cyclone." 

"They abuse our sky line," continued the New 
Yorker, "and it is likely that we are not yet artistic 
in the construction of our buildings. But I can safely 
assert that we lead in pictorial and decorative art. 
In some of our houses can be found masterpieces in 
the way of paintings and sculpture. One who has the 
entree to our best galleries will find ' 

"Back up," exclaimed the man from Topaz City. 
"There was a game last month in our town in which 
,000 changed hands on a pair of " 



"Ta-romt-tara!" went the orchestra. The stage 
curtain, blushing pink at the name "Asbestos" in- 
scribed upon it, came down with a slow midsummer 
movement. The audience trickled leisurely down 
the elevator and stairs. 

On the sidewalk below, the New Yorker and the 
man from Topaz City shook hands with alcoholic 
gravity. The elevated crashed raucously, surface 
cars hummed and clanged, cabmen swore, newsboys 



The Pride of the Cities 45 

shrieked, wheels clattered ear-piercingly. The New 
Yorker conceived a happy thought, with which he 
aspired to clinch the pre-eminence of his city. 

"You must admit," said he, "that in the way of 
noise New York is far ahead of any other ' 

"Back to the everglades!" said the man from Topaz 
City. " In 1900, when Sousa's band and the repeating 
candidate were in our town you couldn't - 

The rattle of an express wagon drowned the rest of 
the words. 



HOLDING UP A TRAIN 

NOTE. The man who told me these things was for several years an outlaw in 
the Southwest and a follower of the pursuit he so frankly describes. His descrip- 
tion of the modus operandi should prove interesting, his counsel of value to the 
potential passenger in some future " bold-up," while his estimate of the pleasures 
of train robbing will hardly induce any one to adopt it as a profession. I give the 
story in almost exactly his own words. O. H. 

JVlOST people would say, if their opinion was asked 
for, that holding up a train would be a hard job. Well, 
it isn't; it's easy. I have contributed some to the 
uneasiness of railroads and the insomnia of express 
companies, and the most trouble I ever had about 
a hold-up was in being swindled by unscrupulous peo- 
ple while spending the money I got. The danger 
wasn't anything to speak of, and we didn't mind the 
trouble. 

One man has come pretty near robbing a train by 
himself; two have succeeded a few times; three can 
do it if they are hustlers, but five is about the right 
number. The time to do it and the place depend 
upon several things. \ 

The first "stick-up" I was ever in happened in 1890. 
Maybe the way I got into it will explain how most 
train robbers start in the business. Five out of six 

46 



Holding Up a Train 47 

Western outlaws are just cowboys out of a job and 
gone wrong. The sixth is a tough from the East who 
dresses up like a bad man and plays some low-down 
trick that gives the boys a bad name. Wire fences and 
" nesters " made five of them ; a bad heart made the sixth. 

Jim S and I were working on the 101 Ranch 

in Colorado. The nesters had the cowman on the 
go. They had taken up the land and elected officers 
who were hard to get along with. Jim and I rode 
into La Junta one day, going south from a round-up. 
We were having a little fun without malice toward any- 
body when a farmer administration cut in and tried 
to harvest us. Jim shot a deputy marshal, and I 
kind of corroborated his side of the argument. We 
skirmished up and down the main street, the boomers 
having bad luck all the time. After a while we leaned 
forward and shoved for the ranch down on the Ceriso. 
We were riding a couple of horses that couldn't 
fly, but they could catch birds. 

A few days after that, a gang of the La Junta boom- 
ers came to the ranch and wanted us to go back with 
them. Naturally, we declined. We had the house 
on them, and before we were done refusing, that oJd 
'dobe was plumb full of lead. When dark came we 
fagged 'em a batch of bullets and shoved out the back 
door for the rocks. They sure smoked us as we went. 
We had to drift, which we did, and rounded up down 
in Oklahoma. 



48 Sixes and Sevens 

Well, there wasn't anything we could get there, 
and, being mighty hard up, we decided to transact 
a little business with the railroads. Jim and I 
joined forces with Tom and Ike Moore two brothers 
who had plenty of sand they were willing to convert 
into dust. I can call their names, for both of them are 
dead. Tom was shot while robbing a bank in Arkansas; 
Ike was killed during the more dangerous pastime of 
attending a dance in the Creek Nation. 

We selected a place on the Santa Fe where there was 
a bridge across a deep creek surrounded by heavy 
timber. All passenger trains took water at the tank 
close to one end of the bridge. It was a quiet place, 
the nearest house being five miles away. The day 
before it happened, we rested our horses and "made 
medicine" as to how we should get about it. Our 
plans were not at all elaborate, as none of us had ever 
engaged in a hold-up before. 

The Santa Fe flyer was due at the tank at 11.15 P. M. 
At eleven, Tom and I lay down on one side of the 
track, and Jim and Ike took the other. As the train 
rolled up, the headlight flashing far down the track 
and the steam hissing from the engine, I turned weak 
all over. I would have worked a whole year on the 
ranch for nothing to have been out of that affair right 
then. Some of the nerviest men in the business have 
told me that they felt the same way the first time. 

The engine had hardly stopped when I jumped 



Holding Up a Train 49 

on the running-board on one side, while Jim mounted 
the other. As soon as the engineer and fireman saw 
our guns they threw up their hands without being told, 
and begged us not to shoot, saying they would do 
anything we wanted them to. 

"Hit the ground," I ordered, and they both jumped 
off. We drove them before us down the side of the 
train. While this was happening, Tom and Ike had 
been blazing away, one on each side of the train, yelling 
like Apaches, so as to keep the passengers herded in 
the cars. Some fellow stuck a little twenty-two 
calibre out one of the coach windows and fired it 
straight up in the air. I let drive and smashed the 
glass just over his head. That settled everything like 
resistance from that direction. 

By this time all my nervousness was gone. I felt 
a kind of pleasant excitement as if I were at a dance or 
a frolic of some sort. The lights were all out in the 
coaches, and, as Tom and Ike gradually quit firing 
and yelling, it got to be almost as still as a graveyard. 
I remember hearing a little bird chirping in a bush at 
the side of the track, as if it were complaining at being 
waked up. 

I made the fireman get a lantern, and then I went 
to the express car and yelled to the messenger to open 
up or get perforated. He slid the door back and stood 
in it with his hands up. "Jump overboard, son," 
I said, and he hit the dirt like a lump of lead. There 



50 Sixes and Sevens 

were two safes in the car a big one and a little one. 
By the way, I first located the messenger's arsenal a 
double-barrelled shot-gun with buckshot cartridges and 
a thirty-eight in a drawer. I drew the cartridges from 
the shot-gun, pocketed the pistol, and called the mes- 
senger inside. I shoved my gun against his nose and 
put him to work. He couldn't open the big safe, but 
he did the little one. There was only nine hundred 
dollars in it. That was mighty small winnings for our 
trouble, so we decided to go through the passengers. 
We took our prisoners to the smoking-car, and from 
there sent the engineer through the train to light up 
the coaches. Beginning with the first one, we placed 
& man at each door and ordered the passengers to stand 
between the seats with their hands up. 

If you want to find out what cowards the majority 
of men are, all you have to do is rob a passenger train. 
I don't mean because they don't resist I'll tell you 
later on why they can't do that but it makes a man 
feel sorry for them the way they lose their heads. 
Big, burly drummers and farmers and ex-soldiers and 
high-collared dudes and sports that, a few moments 
before, were filling the car with noise and bragging, 
get so scared that their ears flop. 

There were very few people in the day coaches at 
that time of night, so we made a slim haul until we 
got to the sleeper. The Pullman conductor met me 
at one door while Jim was going round to the other 



Holding Up a Train 51 

one. He very politely informed me that I could not 
go into that car, as it did not belong to the railroad 
company, and, besides, the passengers had already 
been greatly disturbed by the shouting and firing. 
Never in all my life have I met with a finer instance of 
official dignity and reliance upon the power of Mr. Pull- 
man's great name. I jabbed my six-shooter so hard 
against Mr. Conductor's front that I afterward found 
one of his vest buttons so firmly wedged in the end of 
the barrel that I had to shoot it out. He just shut up 
like a weak-springed knife and rolled down the car steps, 

I opened the door of the sleeper and stepped inside. 
A big, fat old man came wabbling up to me, puffing 
and blowing. He had one coat-sleeve on and was try- 
ing to put his vest on over that. I don't know who 
he thought I was. 

"Young man, young man," says he, "you must 
keep cool and not get excited. Above everything, 
keep cool. " 

"I can't," says I. "Excitement's just eating me 
up." And then I let out a yell and turned loose my 
forty -five through the skylight. 

That old man tried to dive into one of the lower 
berths, but a screech came out of it and a bare foot 
that took him in the bread-basket and landed him on 
the floor. I saw Jim coming in the other door, and 
I hollered for everybody to climb out and line up. 

They commenced to scramble down, and for a while 



52 Sixes and Sevens 

we had a three-ringed circus. The men looked as 
frightened and tame as a lot of rabbits in a deep snow. 
They had on, on an average, about a quarter of a suit 
of clothes and one shoe apiece. One chap was sitting 
on the floor of the aisle, looking as if he were working a 
hard sum in arithmetic. He was trying, very solemn, to 
pull a lady's number two shoe on his number nine foot. 

The ladies didn't stop to dress. They were so curious 
to see a real, live train robber, bless 'em, that they just 
wrapped blankets and sheets around themselves and 
came out, squeaky and fidgety looking. They always 
show more curiosity and sand than the men do. 

We got them all lined up and pretty quiet, and I went 
through the bunch. I found very little on them I 
mean in the way of valuables. One man in the line 
was a sight. He was one of those big, overgrown, 
solemn snoozers that sit on the platform at lectures 
and look wise. Before crawling out he had managed 
to put on his long, frock-tailed coat and his high silk 
hat. The rest of him was nothing but pajamas and 
bunions. When I dug into that Prince Albert, I ex- 
pected to drag out at least a block of gold mine stock 
or an armful of Government bonds, but all I found was 
a little boy's French harp about four inches long. 
What it was there for, I don't know. I felt a little 
mad because he had fooled me so. I stuck the harp 
up against his mouth. 

"If you can't pay play," I says. 



Holding Up a Train 53 

"I can't play," says he. 

"Then learn right off quick," says I, letting him 
smell the end of my gun-barrel. 

He caught hold of the harp, turned red as a beet, 
and commenced to blow. He blew a dinky little tune 
I remembered hearing when I was a kid: 

Prettiest little gal in the country oh! 
Mammy and Daddy told me so. 

I made him keep on playing it all the time we were 
in the car. Now and then he'd get weak and off the 
key, and I'd turn my gun on him and ask what was 
the matter with that little gal, and whether he had 
any intention of going back on her, which would make 
him start up again like sixty. I think that old boy 
standing there in his silk hat and bare feet, playing his 
little French harp, was the funniest sight I ever saw. 
One little red-headed woman in the line broke out 
laughing at him. You could have heard her in the 
next car. 

Then Jim held them steady while I searched the 
berths. I grappled around in those beds and 
filled a pillow-case with the strangest assortment 
of stuff you ever saw. Now and then I'd come 
across a little pop-gun pistol, just about right 
for plugging teeth with, which I'd throw out the 
window. When I finished with the collection, I 
dumped the pillow-case load in the middle of the aisle. 



54 Sixes and Sevens 

There were a good many watches, bracelets, rings, and 
pocket-books, with a sprinkling of false teeth, whiskey 
flasks, face-powder boxes, chocolate caramels, and 
heads of hair of various colours and lengths. There 
were also about a dozen ladies' stockings into which 
jewellery, watches, and rolls of bills had been stuffed 
and then wadded up tight and stuck under the mat- 
tresses. I offered to return what I called the " scalps, " 
saying that we were not Indians on the war-path, but 
none of the ladies seemed to know to whom the hair 
belonged. 

One of the women and a good-looker she was 
wrapped in a striped blanket, saw me pick up one of 
the stockings that- was pretty chunky and heavy about 
the toe, and she snapped out: 

"That's mine, sir. You're not in the business of 
robbing women, are you? " 

Now, as this was our first hold-up, we hadn't agreed 
upon any code of ethics, so I hardly knew what to 
answer. But, anyway, I replied: "Well, not as a 
specialty. If this contains your personal property 
you can have it back. " 

"It just does," she declared eagerly, and reached 
out her hand for it. 

"You'll excuse my taking a look at the contents," 
I said, holding the stocking up by the toe. Out 
dumped a big gent's gold watch, worth two hundred, 
a gent's leather pocket-book that we afterward found 



Holding Up a Train 55 

to contain six hundred dollars, a 32-calibre revolver; 
and the only thing of the lot that could have been a 
lady's personal property was a silver bracelet worth 
about fifty cents. 

I said: "Madame, here's your property," and 
handed her the bracelet. "Now," I went on, "how 
can you expect us to act square with you when you 
try to deceive us in this manner? I'm surprised at 
such conduct. " 

The young woman flushed upas if she had been 
caught doing something dishonest. Some other woman 
down the line called out: "The mean thing!" I 
never knew whether she meant the other lady or me. 

When we finished our job we ordered everybody 
back to bed, told 'em good night very politely at the 
door, and left. We" rode forty miles before daylight 
and then divided the stuff. Each one of us got 
$1,752.85 in money. We lumped the jewellery around. 
Then we scattered, each man for himself. 

That was my first train robbery, and it was about 
as easily done as any of the ones that followed. But 
that was the last and only time I ever went through 
the passengers. I don't like that part of the business. 
Afterward I stuck strictly to the express car. During 
the next eight years I handled a good deal of money. 

The best haul I made was just seven years after 
the first one. We found out about a train that was 
going to bring out a lot of money to pay off the soldiers 



56 Sixes and Sevens 

at a Government post. We stuck that train up in 
broad daylight. Five of us lay in the sand hills near 
a little station. Ten soldiers were guarding the money 
on the train, but they might just as well have been at 
home on a furlough. We didn't even allow them to 
stick their heads out the windows to see the fun. 
We had no trouble at all in getting the money, which 
was all in gold. Of course, a big howl was raised at 
the time about the robbery. It was Government stuff, 
and the Government got sarcastic and wanted to know 
what the convoy of soldiers went along for. The 
only excuse given was that nobody was expecting an 
attack among those bare sand hills in daytime. I 
don't know what the Government thought about the 
excuse, but I know that it was a good one. The 
surprise that is the keynote of the train-robbing 
business. The papers published all kinds of stories 
about the loss, finally agreeing that it was between 
nine thousand and ten thousand dollars. The Gov- 
ernment sawed wood. Here are the correct figures, 
printed for the first time forty-eight thousand 
dollars. If anybody will take the trouble to look over 
Uncle Sam's private accounts for that little debit to 
profit and loss, he will find that I am right to a cent. 

By that time we were expert enough to know what 
to do. We rode due west twenty miles, making a 
trail that a Broadway policeman could have followed, 
and then we doubled back, hiding our tracks. On the 



Holding Up a Train 57 

second night after the hold-up, while posses were 
scouring the country in every direction, Jim and I 
were eating supper in the second story of a friend's 
house in the town where the alarm started from. 
Our friend pointed out to us, in an office across the 
street, a printing press at work striking off handbills 
offering a reward for our capture. 

I have been asked what we do with the money we 
get. Well, I never could account for a tenth part of 
it after it was spent. It goes fast and freely. An 
outlaw has to have a good many friends. A highly 
respected citizen may, and often does, get along with 
very few, but a man on the dodge has got to have 
"sidekickers." With angry posses and reward-hungry 
officers cutting out a hot trail for him, he must have 
a few places scattered about the country where he 
can stop and feed himself and his horse and get a 
few hours' sleep without having to keep both eyes open. 
When he makes a haul he feels like dropping some of 
the coin with these friends, and he does it liberally. 
Sometimes I have, at the end of a hasty visit at one 
of these havens of refuge, flung a handful of gold and 
bills into the laps of the kids playing on the floor, 
without knowing whether my contribution was a 
hundred dollars or a thousand. 

When old-timers make a big haul they generally 
go far away to one of the big cities to spend their 
money. Green hands, however successful a hold-up 



58 Sixes and Sevens 

they make, nearly always give themselves away by 
showing too much money near the place where they 
got it. 

I was in a job in '94 where we got twenty thousand 
dollars. We followed our favourite plan for a get-away 
that is, doubled on our trail and laid low for a 
time near the scene of the train's bad luck. One 
morning I picked up a newspaper and read an article 
with big headlines stating that the marshal, with eight 
deputies and a posse of thirty armed citizens, had the 
train robbers surrounded in a mesquite thicket on the 
Cimarron, and that it was a question of only a few 
hours when they would be dead men or prisoners. 
While I was reading 'that article I was sitting at break- 
fast in one of the most elegant private residences in 
Washington City, with a flunky in knee pants standing 
behind my chair. Jim was sitting across the table 
talking to his half-uncle, a retired naval officer, whose 
name you have often seen in the accounts of doings 
in the capital. We had gone there and bought 
rattling outfits of good clothes, and were resting from 
our labours among the nabobs. We must have been 
killed in that mesquite thicket, for I can make an 
affidavit that we didn't surrender. 

Now I propose to tell why it is easy to hold up a 
train, and, then, why no one should ever do it. 

In the first place, the attacking party has all the 
advantage. That is, of course, supposing that they are 



Holding Up a Train 59 

old-timers with the necessary experience and courage. 
They have the outside and are protected by the dark- 
ness, while the others are in the light, hemmed into 
a small space, and exposed, the moment they show a 
head at a window or door, to the aim of a man who is a 
dead shot and who won't hesitate to shoot. 

But, in my opinion, the main condition that makes 
train robbing easy is the element of surprise in con- 
nection with the imagination of the passengers. If 
you have ever seen a horse that has eaten loco weed 
you will understand what I mean when I say that the 
passengers get locoed. That horse gets the awfullest 
imagination on him in the world. You can't coax 
him to cross a little branch stream two feet wide. It 
looks as big to him as the Mississippi River. That's 
just the way with the passenger. He thinks there are 
a hundred men yelling and shooting outside, when may- 
be there are only two or three. And the muzzle of 
a forty-five looks like the entrance to a tunnel. The 
passenger is all right, although he may do mean little 
tricks, like hiding a wad of money in his shoe and for- 
getting to dig-up until you jostle his ribs some with the 
end of your six-shooter; but there's no harm in him. 

As to the train crew, we never had any more trouble 
with them than if they had been so many sheep. I 
don't mean that they are cowards; I mean that 
they have got sense. They know they're not up 
against a bluff. It's the same way with the officers. 



60 Sixes and Sevens 

I've seen secret service men, marshals, and railroad 
detectives fork over their change as meek as 
Moses. I saw one of the bravest marshals I ever 
knew hide his gun under his seat and dig up along 
with the rest while I was taking toll. He wasn't 
afraid; he simply knew that we had the drop on the 
whole outfit. Besides, many of those officers have 
families and they feel that they oughtn't to take 
chances; whereas death has no terrors for the man 
who holds up a train. He expects to get killed 
some day, and he generally does. My advice to you, 
if you should ever be in a hold-up, is to line up with 
the cowards and save your bravery for an occasion 
when it may be of some benefit to you. Another rea- 
son why officers are backward about mixing things with 
a train robber is a financial one. Every time there 
is a scrimmage and somebody gets killed, the officers 
lose money. If the train robber gets away they 
swear out a warrant against John Doe et al. and travel 
hundreds of miles and sign vouchers for thousands on 
the trail of the fugitives, and the Government foots 
the bills. So, with them, it is a question of mileage 
rather than courage. 

I will give one instance to support my statement 
that the surprise is the best card in playing for a 
hold-up. 

Along in '92 the Daltons were cutting out a hot trail 
for the officers down in the Cherokee Nation. Those 



Holding Up a Train 61 

were their lucky days, and they got so reckless and 
sandy, that they used to announce before hand what 
job they were going to undertake. Once they gave 
it out that they were going to hold up the M. K. & T. 
flyer on a certain night at the station of Pryor Creek, 
in Indian Territory. 

That night the railroad company got fifteen deputy 
marshals in Muscogee and put them on the train. 
Beside them they had fifty armed men hid in the depot 
at Pryor Creek. 

When the Katy Flyer pulled in not a Dalton showed 
up. The next station was Adair, six miles away. 
When the train reached there, and the deputies were 
having a good time explaining what they would have 
done to the Dalton gang if they had turned up, all 
at once it sounded like an army firing outside. The 
conductor and brakeman came running into the car 
yelling, "Train robbers!" 

Some of those deputies lit out of the door, hit the 
ground, and kept on running. Some of them hid their 
Winchesters under the seats. Two of them made a 
fight and were both killed. 

It took the Daltons just ten minutes to capture the 
train and whip the escort. In twenty minutes more 
they robbed the express car of twenty-seven thousand 
dollars and made a clean get-away. 

My opinion is that those deputies would have put 
up a stiff fight at Pryor Creek, where they were ex- 



62 Sixes and Sevens 

pecting trouble, but they were taken by surprise and 
"locoed" at Adair, just as the Daltons, who knew 
their business, expected they would. 

I don't think I ought to close without giving some 
deductions from my experience of eight years "on the 
dodge." It doesn't pay to rob trains. Leaving out 
the question of right and morals, which I don't think 
I ought to tackle, there is very little to envy in the 
life of an outlaw. After a while money ceases to have 
any value in his eyes. He gets to looking upon the 
railroads and express companies as his bankers, and 
his six-shooter as a cheque book good for any amount. 
He throws away money right and left. Most of the 
time he is on the jump, riding day and night, and he 
lives so hard between times that he doesn't enjoy the 
taste of high life when he gets it. He knows that his 
time is bound to come to lose his life or liberty, and 
that the accuracy of his aim, the speed of his horse, 
and the fidelity of his "sider, " are all that postpone the 
inevitable. 

It isn't that he loses any sleep over danger from the 
officers of the law. In all my experience I never knew 
officers to attack a band of outlaws unless they out- 
numbered them at least three to one. 

But the outlaw carries one thought constantly in 
his mind and that is what makes him so sore against 
life, more than anything else he knows where the 
marshals get their recruits of deputies. He knows 



Holding Up a Train 63 

that the majority of these upholders of the law were 
once lawbreakers, horse thieves, rustlers, highwaymen, 
and outlaws like himself, and that they gained their 
positions and immunity by turning state's evidence, 
by turning traitor and delivering up their comrades 
to imprisonment and death. He knows that some 
day unless he is shot first his Judas will set to 
work, the trap will be laid, and he will be the surprised 
instead of a surpriser at a stick-up. 

That is why the man who holds up trains picks his 
company with a thousand times the care with which 
a careful girl chooses a sweetheart. That is why he 
raises himself from his blanket of nights and listens 
to the tread of every horse's hoofs on the distant road. 
That is why he broods suspiciously for days upon a 
jesting remark or an unusual movement of a tried 
comrade, or the broken mutterings of his closest 
friend, sleeping by his side. 

And it is one of the reasons why the train-robbing 
profession is not so pleasant a one as either of its 
collateral branches politics or cornering the market. 



VI 

ULYSSES AND THE DOGMAN 

DO YOU know the time of the dogmen? 

When the forefinger of twilight begins to smudge 
the clear-drawn lines of the Big City there is inaugu- 
rated an hour devoted to one of the most melancholy 
sights of urban life. 

Out from the towering flat crags and apartment 
peaks of the cliff dwellers of New York steals an army 
of beings that were once men. Even yet they go 
upright upon two limbs and retain human form and 
speech; but you will observe that they are behind 
animals in progress. Each of these beings follows 
a dog, to which he is fastened by an artificial 
ligament. 

These men are all victims to Circe. Not willingly 
do they become flunkeys to Fido, bell boys to bull 
terriers, and toddlers after Towzer. Modern Circe, in- 
stead of turning them into animals, has kindly left 
the difference of a six-foot leash between them. Every 
one of those dogmen has been either cajoled, bribed, 
or commanded by his own particular Circe to take 
the dear household pet out for an airing. 

64 



Ulysses and the Dogman 65 

By their faces and manner you can tell that the 
dogmen are bound in a hopeless enchantment. Never 
will there come even a dog-catcher Ulysses to remove 
the spell. 

The faces of some are stonily set. They are past 
the commiseration, the curiosity, or the jeers of their 
fellow-beings. Years of matrimony, of continuous 
compulsory canine constitutionals, have made them 
callous. They unwind their beasts from lamp posts, 
or the ensnared legs of profane pedestrians, with the 
stolidity of mandarins manipulating the strings of 
their kites. 

Others, more recently reduced to the ranks of 
Rover's retinue, take their medicine sulkily and 
fiercely. They play the dog on the end of their 
line with the pleasure felt by the girl out fishing when 
she catches a sea-robin on her hook. They glare at 
you threateningly if you look at them, as if it would 
be their delight to let slip the dogs of war. These are 
half-mutinous dogmen, not quite Circe-ized, and you 
will do well not to kick their charges, should they sniff 
around your ankles. 

Others of the tribe do not seem to feel so keenly. 
They are mostly unfresh youths, with gold caps and 
drooping cigarettes, who do not harmonize with their 
dogs. The animals they attend wear satin bows 
in their collars; and the young men steer them so 
assiduously that you are tempted to the theory 



66 Sixes and Sevens 

that some personal advantage, contingent upon 
satisfactory service, waits upon the execution of 
their duties. 

The dogs thus personally conducted are of many 
varieties; but they are one in fatness, in pampered, 
diseased vileness of temper, in insolent, snarling capri- 
ciousness of behaviour. They tug at the leash frac- 
tiously, they make leisurely nasal inventory of every 
door step, railing, and post. They sit down to rest 
when they choose; they wheeze like the winner of a 
Third Avenue beefsteak-eating contest; they blunder 
clumsily into open cellars and coal holes; they lead 
the dogmen a merry dance. 

These unfortunate dry nurses of dogdom, the cur 
cuddlers, mongrel managers, Spitz stalkers, poodle 
pullers, Skye scrapers, dachshund dandlers, terrier 
trailers and Pomeranian pushers of the cliff-dwelling 
Circes follow their charges meekly. The doggies 
neither fear nor respect them. Masters of the house 
these men whom they hold in leash may be, but they 
are not masters of them. From cosey corner to fire 
escape, from divan to dumbwaiter, doggy's snarl easily 
drives this two-legged being who is commissioned 
to walk at the other end of his string during 
his outing. 

One twilight the dogmen came forth as usual at 
their Circes' pleading, guerdon, or crack of the whip. 
One among them was a strong man, apparently of 



Ulysses and the Dogman 67 

too solid virtues for this airy vocation. His expres- 
sion was melancholic, his manner depressed. He 
was leashed to a vile white dog, loathsomely fat, 
fiendishly ill-natured, gloatingly intractable toward 
his despised conductor. 

At a corner nearest to his apartment house the 
dogman turned down a side street, hoping for fewer 
witnesses to his ignominy. The surfeited beast 
waddled before him, panting with spleen and the 
labour of motion. 

Suddenly the dog stopped. A tall, brown, long- 
coated, wide-brimmed man stood like a Colossus 
blocking the sidewalk and declaring: 

"Well, I'm a son of a gun!" 

"Jim Berry!" breathed the dogman, with exclama- 
tion points in his voice. 

"Sam Telfair," cried Wide-Brim again, "you ding- 
basted old willy- walloo, give us your hoof!" 

Their hands clasped in the brief, tight greeting 
of the West that is death to the hand-shake 
microbe. 

"You old fat rascal!" continued Wide-Brim, 
with a wrinkled brown smile; "it's been five 
years since I seen you. I been in this town a 
week, but you can't find nobody in such a place. 
Well, you dinged old married man, how are they 
coming?" 

Something mushy and heavily soft like raised dough 



68 Sixes and Sevens 

leaned against Jim's leg and chewed his trousers with 
a yeasty growl. 

"Get to work," said Jim, "and explain this yard- 
wide hydrophobia yearling you've throwed your lasso 
over. Are you the pound-master of this burg? Do 
you call that a dog or what?" 

"I need a drink," said the dogman, dejected at 
the reminder of his old dog of the sea. "Come on." 

Hard by was a cafe. "Pis ever so in the big 
city. 

They sat at a table, and the bloated monster yelped 
and scrambled at the end of his leash to get at the 
cafe cat. 

"Whiskey," said Jim to the waiter. 

"Make it two," said the dogman. 

"You're fatter," said Jim, "and you look subju- 
gated. I don't know about the East agreeing with 
you. All the boys asked me to hunt you up when 
I started. Sandy King, he went to the Klondike. 
Watson Burrel, he married the oldest Peters girl. 
I made some money buying beeves, and I bought 
a lot of wild land up on the Little Powder. Going 
to fence next fall. Bill Rawlins, he's gone to farming. 
You remember Bill, of course he was courting 
Marcella excuse me, Sam I mean the lady you 
married, while she was teaching school at Prairie 
View. But you was the lucky man. How is Missis 
Telfair?" 



Ulysses and the Dogman 69 

"S-h-h-h!" said the dogman, signalling the waiter; 
"give it a name." 

"Whiskey," said Jim. 

"Make it two," said the dogman. 

"She's well," he continued, after his chaser. "She 
refused to live anywhere but in New York, where 
she came from. We live in a flat. Every evening at 
six I take that dog out for a walk. It's Marcella's 
pet. There never were two animals on earth, Jim, 
that hated one another like me and that dog does. 
His name's Lovekins. Marcella dresses for dinner 
while we're out. We eat tabble dote. Ever try one 
of them, Jim?" 

"No, I never," said Jim. "I seen the signs, but 
I thought they said 'table de hole.' I thought it 
was French for pool tables. How does it taste?" 

"If you're going to be in the city for awhile we 
will " 

"No, sir-ee. I'm starting for home this evening on 
the 7.25. Like to stay longer, but I can't." 

"I'll walk down to the ferry with you," said the 
dogman. 

The dog had bound a leg each of Jim and the chair 
together, and had sunk into a comatose slumber. 
Jim stumbled, and the leash was slightly wrenched. 
The shrieks of the awakened beast rang for a block 
around. 

"If that's your dog," said Jim, when they were on 



70 Sixes and Sevens 

the street again, "what's to hinder you from run- 
ning that habeas corpus you've got around his neck 
over a limb and walking off and forgetting him?" 

"I'd never dare to," said the dogman, awed at 
the bold proposition. "He sleeps in the bed. I sleep 
on a lounge. He runs howling to Marcella if I look 
at him. Some night, Jim, I'm going to get even with 
that dog. I've made up my mind to do it. I'm go- 
ing to creep over with a knife and cut a hole in his 
mosquito bar so they can get in to him. See if I 
don't do it!" 

"You ain't yourself, Sam Telfair. You ain't what 
you was once. I don't know about these cities and 
flats over here. With my own eyes I seen you stand 
off both the Tillotson boys in Prairie View with the 
brass faucet out of a molasses barrel. And I seen 
you rope and tie the wildest steer on Little Powder 
in 39 1-2." 

"I did, didn't I?" said the other, with a temporary 
gleam in his eye. "But that was before I was dog- 
matized." 

"Does Misses Telfair" began Jim. 

"Hush!" said the dogman. "Here's another cafe." 

They lined up at the bar. The dog fell asleep at 
their feet. 

"Whiskey," said Jim. 

"Make it two," said the dogman. 

"I thought about you," said Jim, "when I bought 



Ulysses and the Dogman 71 

that wild land. I wished you was out there to help 
me with the stock." 

"Last Tuesday," said the dogman, "he bit me on 
the ankle because I asked for cream in my coffee. 
He always gets the cream." 

"You'd like Prairie View now," said Jim. "The 
boys from the round-ups for fifty miles around ride 
in there. One corner of my pasture is in sixteen 
miles of the town. There's a straight forty miles 
of wire on one side of it." 

"You pass through the kitchen to get to the bed- 
room," said the dogman, "and you pass through the 
parlour to get to the bath room, and you back out 
through the dining-room to get into the bedroom so 
you can turn around and leave by the kitchen. And 
he snores and barks in his sleep, and I have to smoke 
in the park on account of his asthma." 

"Don't Missis Telfair" began Jim. , 

"Oh, shut up!" said the dogman. "What is it this 
time?" 

"Whiskey, "said Jim. 

"Make it two," said the dogman. 

"Well, I'll be racking along down toward the ferry," 
said the other. 

" Come on, there, you mangy, turtle-backed, snake- 
headed, bench-legged ton-and-a-half of soap-grease!" 
shouted the dogman, with a new note in his voice 
and a new hand on the leash. The dog scrambled 



72 Sixes and Sevens 

after them, with an angry whine at such unusual 
language from his guardian. 

At the foot of Twenty-third Street the dogman led 
the way through swinging doors. 

"Last chance," said he. "Speak up." 

"Whiskey," said Jim. 

"Make it two," said the dogman. 

"I don't know," said the ranchman, "where I'll 
find the man I want to take charge of the Little 
Powder outfit. I want somebody I know something 
about. Finest stretch of prairie and timber you ever 
squinted your eye over, Sam. Now if you was 

"Speaking of hydrophobia," said the dogman, "the 
other night he chewed a piece out of my leg because 
I knocked a fly off of Marcella's arm. 'It ought to 
be cauterized,' says Marcella, and I was thinking so 
myself. I telephones for the doctor, and when he 
comes Marcella says to me: 'Help me hold the poor 
dear while the doctor fixes his mouth. Oh, I hope he 
got no virus on any of his toofies when he bit you.' 
Now what do you think of that?" 

"Does Missis Telfair" began Jim. 

"Oh, drop it," said the dogman. "Come again!" 

"Whiskey," said Jim. 

" Make it two," said the dogman. 

They walked on to the ferry. The ranchman 
stepped to the ticket window. 

Suddenly the swift landing of three or four heavy 



Ulysses and the Dogman 73 

kicks was heard, the air was rent by piercing canine 
shrieks, and a pained, outraged, lubberly, bow-legged 
pudding of a dog ran frenziedly up the street alone. 

"Ticket to Denver," said Jim. 

"Make it two," shouted the ex-dogman, reaching 
for his inside pocket. 



vn 

THE CHAMPION OF THE WEATHER 

IF YOU should speak of the Kiowa Reservation 
to the average New Yorker he probably wouldn't 
know whether you were referring to a new political 
dodge at Albany or a leitmotif from "Parsifal." But 
out in the Kiowa Reservation advices have been re- 
ceived concerning the existence of New York. 

A party of us were on a hunting trip in the Reser- 
vation. Bud Kingsbury, our guide, philosopher, and 
friend, was broiling antelope steaks in camp one night. 
One of the party, a pinkish-haired young man in a 
correct hunting costume, sauntered over to the fire 
to light a cigarette, and remarked carelessly to Bud : 

"Nice night!" 

"Why, yes," said Bud, "as nice as any night could be 
that ain't received the Broadway stamp of approval." 

Now, the young man was from New York, but the 
rest of us wondered how Bud guessed it. So, when the 
steaks were done, we besought him to lay bare his 
system of ratiocination. And as Bud was something 
of a Territorial talking machine he made oration as 
follows: 

74 



The Champion of the Weather 75 

"How did I know he was from New York? Well, I 
figured it out as soon as he sprung them two words 
on me. I was in New York myself a couple of years 
ago, and I noticed some of the earmarks and hoof 
tracks of the Rancho Manhattan." 

"Found New York rather different from the Pan- 
handle, didn't you, Bud? " asked one of the hunters. 

"Can't say that I did/'^answered Bud; "anyways, 
not more than some. The main trail in that town 
which they call Broadway is plenty travelled, but 
they're about the same brand of bipeds that tramp 
around in Cheyenne and Amarillo. At first I was 
sort of rattled by the crowds, but I soon says to myself, 
* Here, now, Bud; they're just plain folks like you and 
Geronimo and Grover Cleveland and the Watson 
boys, so don't get all flustered up with consternation 
under your saddle blanket,' and then I feels calm 
and peaceful, like I was back in the Nation again at a 
ghost dance or a green corn pow-wow. 

"I'd been saving up for a year to give this New York 
a whirl. I knew a man named Summers that lived 
there, but I couldn't find him; so I played a lone 
hand at enjoying the intoxicating pleasures of the 
corn-fed metropolis. 

"For a while I was so frivolous and locoed by the 
electric lights and the noises of the phonographs and 
the second-story railroads that I forgot one of the 
crying needs of my Western system of natural require- 



76 Sixes and Sevens 

ments. I never was no hand to deny myself the 
pleasures of sociable vocal intercourse with friends and 
strangers. Out in the Territories when I meet a man 
I never saw before, inside of nine minutes I know 
his income, religion, size of collar, and his wife's 
temper, and how much he pays for clothes, alimony, 
and chewing tobacco. It's a gift with me not to be 
penurious with my conversation. 

"But this here New York was inaugurated on the 
idea of abstemiousness in regard to the parts of speech. 
At the end of three weeks nobody in the city had fired 
even a blank syllable in my direction except the 
waiter in the grub emporium where I fed. And as 
his outpourings of syntax wasn't nothing but plagia- 
risms from the bill of fare, he never satisfied my yearn- 
ings, which was to have somebody hit. If I stood 
next to a man at a bar he'd edge off and give a Baldwin- 
Ziegler look as if he suspected me of having the North 
Pole concealed on my person. I began to wish that 
I'd gone to Abilene or Waco for my paseado; for 
the mayor of them places will drink with you, and 
the first citizen you meet will tell you his middle 
name and ask you to take a chance in a raffle for a 
music box. 

" Well, one day when I was particular hankering for 
to be gregarious with something more loquacious than 
a lamp post, a fellow in a caffy says to me, says he: 

"'Nice day!' 






The Champion of the Weather 77 

"He was a kind of a manager of the place, and I 
reckon he'd seen me in there a good many times. He 
had a face like a fish and an eye like Judas, but I got 
up and put one arm around his neck. 

" 'Pardner,' I says, 'sure it's a nice day. You're the 
first gentleman in all New York to observe that the 
intricacies of human speech might not be altogether 
wasted on William Kingsbury. But don't you think,' 
says I, 'that 'twas a little cool early in the morning; 
and ain't there a feeling of rain in the air to-night? 
But along about noon it sure was gallupsious weather. 
How's all up to the house? You doing right well with 
the caffy, now?' 

"Well, sir, that galoot just turns his back and walks 
off stiff, without a word, after all my trying to be 
agreeable! I didn't know what to make of it. That 
night I finds a note from Summers, who'd been away 
from town, giving the address of his camp. I goes up 
to his house and has a good, old-time talk with his 
folks. And I tells Summers about the actions of this 
coyote in the caffy, and desires interpretation. 

"'Oh,' says Summers, 'he wasn't intending to strike 
up a conversation with you. That's just the New 
York style. He'd seen you was a regular customer and 
he spoke a word or two just to show you he appreciated 
your custom. You oughtn't to have followed it up. 
That's about as far as we care to go with a stranger. 
A word or so about the weather may be ventured, 



78 Sixes and Sevens 

but we don't generally make it the basis of an 
acquaintance.' 

"Billy,' says I, 'the weather and its ramifications 
is a solemn subject with me. Meteorology is one of 
my sore points. No man can open up the question of 
temperature or humidity or the glad sunshine with 
me, and then turn tail on it without its leading to 
a falling barometer. I'm going down to see that man 
again and give him a lesson in the art of continuous 
conversation. You say New York etiquette allows 
him two words and no answer. Well, he's going to 
turn himself into a weather bureau and finish what 
he begun with me, besides indulging in neighbourly 
remarks on other subjects.' 

"Summers talked agin it, but I was irritated some 
and I went on the street car back to that caffy. 

"The same fellow was there yet, walking round in 
a sort of back corral where there was tables and 
chairs. A few people was sitting around having 
drinks and sneering at one another. 

"I called that man to one side and heided him into 
a corner. I unbuttoned enough to show him a thirty- 
eight I carried stuck under my vest. 

"'Pardner,' I says, 'a brief space ago I was in here 
and you seized the opportunity to say it was a nice 
day. When I attempted to corroborate your weather 
signal, you turned your back and walked off. Now,' 
says I, 'you frog-hearted, language-shy, stiff-necked 



The Champion of the Weather 79 

cross between a Spitzbergen sea cook and a muzzled 
oyster, you resume where you left off in your discourse 
on the weather.' 

"The fellow looks at me and tries to grin, but he 
sees I don't and he comes around serious. 

"'Well,' says he, eyeing the handle of my gun, 
'it was rather a nice day; some warmish, though.' 

" ' Particulars, you mealy-mouthed snoozer,' I says 
'let's have the specifications expatiate fill in the 
outlines. When you start anything with me in short- 
hand it's bound to turn out a storm signal.' 

"'Looked like rain yesterday,' says the man, 'but 
it cleared off fine in the forenoon. I hear the farmers 
are needing rain right badly up-State.' 

'"That's the kind of a canter,' says I. 'Shake the 
New York dust off your hoofs and be a real agreeable 
kind of a centaur. You broke the ice, you know, 
and we're getting better acquainted every minute. 
Seems to me I asked you about your family?' 

"'They're all well, thanks,' says he. 'We we 
have a new piano.' 

" 'Now you're coming it,' I says. 'This cold reserve 
is breaking up at last. That little touch about the 
piano almost makes us brothers. What's the youngest 
kid's name?' I asks him. 

"'Thomas,' says he. 'He's just getting well from 
the measles.' 

"'I feel like I'd known you always,' says I. 'Now 



80 Sixes and Sevens 

there was just one more are you doing right well 
with the caffy, now? ' 

'"Pretty well,' he says. 'I'm putting away a little 
money.' 

"'Glad to hear it,' says I. 'Now go back to your 
work and get civilized. Keep your hands off the 
weather unless you're ready to follow it up in a per- 
sonal manner. It's a subject that naturally belongs 
to sociability and the forming of new ties, and I hate 
to see it handed out in small change in a town 
like this.' 

"So the next day I rolls up my blankets and hits 
the trail away from New York City." 

For many minutes after Bud ceased talking we 
lingered around the fire, and then all hands began to 
disperse for bed. 

As I was unrolling my bedding I heard the pinkish- 
haired young man saying to Bud, with something like 
anxiety in his voice: 

"As I say, Mr. Kingsbury, there is something really 
beautiful about this night. The delightful breeze 
and the bright stars and the clear air unite in making 
it wonderfully attractive." 

"Yes," said Bud, "it's a nice night." 



VIII 
MAKES THE WHOLE WORLD KIN 

1 HE burglar stepped inside the window quickly, 
and then he took his time. A burglar who respects 
his art always takes his time before taking anything 
else. 

The house was a private residence. By its boarded 
front door and untrimmed Boston ivy the burglar knew 
that the mistress of it was sitting on some ocean- 
side piazza telling a sympathetic man in a yachting 
cap that no one had ever understood her sensitive, 
lonely heart. He knew by the light in the third- 
story front windows, and by the lateness of the sea- 
son, that the master of the house had come home, 
and would soon extinguish his light and retire. For 
it was September of the year and of the soul, in which 
season the house's good man comes to consider roof 
gardens and stenographers as vanities, and to desire 
the return of his mate and the more durable blessings 
of decorum and the moral excellencies. 

The burglar lighted a cigarette. The guarded glow 
of the match illuminated his salient points for a 
moment. He belonged to the third type of burglars. 

81 



82 Sixes and Sevens 

This third type has not yet been recognized and 
accepted. The police have made us familiar with the 
first and second. Their classification is simple. The 
collar is the distinguishing mark. 

When a burglar is caught who does not wear a 
collar he is described as a degenerate of the lowest 
type, singularly vicious and depraved, and is suspected 
of being the desperate criminal who stole the hand- 
cuffs out of Patrolman Hennessy's pocket in 1878 
and walked away to escape arrest. 

The other well-known type is the burglar who wears 
a collar. He is always referred to as a Raffles in 
real life. He is invariably a gentleman by daylight, 
breakfasting in a dress suit, and posing as a paper- 
hanger, while after dark he plies his nefarious occu- 
pation of burglary. His mother is an extremely 
wealthy and respected resident of Ocean Grove, and 
when he is conducted to his cell he asks at once for 
a nail file and the Police Gazette. He always has a 
wife in every State in the Union and fiancees in all 
the Territories, and the newspapers print his matri- 
monial gallery out of their stock of cuts of the ladies 
who were cured by only one bottle after having been 
given up by five doctors, experiencing great relief 
after the first dose. 

The burglar wore a blue sweater. He was neither 
a Raffles nor one of the chefs from Hell's Kitchen. 
The police would have been baffled had they attempted 



Makes the Whole World Kin 83 

to classify him. They have not yet heard of the 
respectable, unassuming burglar who is neither above 
nor below his station. 

This burglar of the third class began to prowl. He 
wore no masks, dark lanterns, or gum shoes. He 
carried a 38-calibre revolver in his pocket, and he 
chewed peppermint gum thoughtfully. 

The furniture of the house was swathed in its summer 
dust protectors. The silver was far away in safe- 
deposit vaults. The burglar expected no remarkable 
"haul." His objective point was that dimly lighted 
room where the master of the house should be sleep- 
ing heavily after whatever solace he had sought to 
lighten the burden of his loneliness. A "touch" might 
be made there to the extent of legitimate, fair pro- 
fessional profits loose money, a watch, a jewelled 
stick-pin nothing exorbitant or beyond reason. He 
had seen the window left open and had taken 
the chance. 

The burglar softly opened the door of the lighted 
room. The gas was turned low. A man lay in the 
bed asleep. On the dresser lay many things in con- 
fusion a crumpled roll of bills, a watch, keys, three 
poker chips, crushed cigars, a pink silk hair bow, and 
an unopened bottle of bromo-seltzer for a bulwark 
in the morning. 

The burglar took three steps toward the dresser. 
The man in the bed suddenly uttered a squeaky groan 



84 Sixes and Sevens 

and opened his eyes. His right hand slid under his 
pillow, but remained there. 

"Lay still," said the burglar in conversational 
tone. Burglars of the third type do not hiss. The 
citizen in the bed looked at the round end of the 
burglar's pistol and lay still. 

"Now hold up both your hands," commanded the 
burglar. 

The citizen had a little, pointed, brown-and-gray 
beard, like that of a painless dentist. He looked 
solid, esteemed, irritable, and disgusted. He sat up 
in bed and raised his right hand above his head. 

"Up with the other one," ordered the burglar. 
"You might be amphibious and shoot with your left. 
You can count two, can't you? Hurry up, now." 

"Can't raise the other one," said the citizen, with 
a contortion of his lineaments. 

"What's the matter with it?" 

"Rheumatism in the shoulder." 

"Inflammatory?" 

"Was. The inflammation has gone down." 

The burglar stood for a moment or two, holding his 
gun on the afflicted one. He glanced at the plunder 
on the dresser and then, with a half-embarrassed air, 
back at the man in the bed. Then he, too, made a 
sudden grimace. 

"Don't stand there making faces," snapped the 
citizen, bad-humouredly. "If you've come to burgle 



Makes the Whole World Kin 85 

why don't you do it? There's some stuff lying 
around." 

"'Scuse me," said the burglar, with a grin; "but 
it just socked me one, too. It's good for you that 
rheumatism and me happens to be old pals. I got it 
in my left arm, too. Most anybody but me would 
have popped you when you wouldn't hoist that left 
claw of yours." 

"How long have you had it?" inquired the citizen. 

"Four years. I guess that ain't all. Once you've got 
it, it's you for a rheumatic life that's my judgment.'* 

"Ever try rattlesnake oil?" asked the citizen, in- 
terestedly. 

"Gallons," said the burglar. "If all the snakes I've 
used the oil of was strung out in a row they'd reach 
eight times as far as Saturn, and the rattles could 
be heard at Valparaiso, Indiana, and back." 

"Some use Chiselum's Pills," remarked the citizen. 

"Fudge ! " said the burglar. "Took 'em five months. 
No good. I had some relief the year I tried Finkel- 
ham's Extract, Balm of Gilead poultices and Potts's 
Pain Pulverizer; but I think it was the buckeye I 
carried in my pocket what done the trick." 

"Is yours worse in the morning or at night?" asked 
the citizen. 

"Night," said the burglar; "just when I'm busiest. 
Say, take down that arm of yours I guess you won't 
Say! did you ever try Blickerstaff's Blood Builder? 



86 Sixes and Sevens 

"I never did. Does yours come in paroxysms or is 
it a steady pain?" 

The burglar sat down on the foot of the bed and 
rested his gun on his crossed knee. 

"It jumps," said he. "It strikes me when I ain't 
looking for it. I had to give up second-story work 
because I got stuck sometimes half-way up. Tell you 
what I don't believe the bloomin' doctors know 
what is good for it." 

"Same here. I've spent a thousand dollars without 
getting any relief. Yours swell any?" 

"Of mornings. And when it's goin' to rain great 
Christopher!" 

"Me, too," said the citizen. "I can tell when a 
streak of humidity the size of a table-cloth starts 
from Florida on its way to New York. And if I 
pass a theatre where there's an 'East Lynne ' matinee 
going on, the moisture starts my left arm jumping 
like a toothache." 

"It's undiluted hades!" said the burglar. 

"You're dead right," said the citizen. 

The burglar looked down at his pistol and thrust 
it into his pocket with an awkward attempt at ease. 

"Say, old man," he said, constrainedly, "ever try 
opodeldoc? " 

"Slop!" said the citizen angrily. "Might as well 
rub on restaurant butter." 

" Sure," concurred the burglar. " It's a salve suitable 



Makes the Whole World Kin 87 

for little Minnie when the kitty scratches her 
finger. I'll tell you what! We're up against it. I 
only find one thing that eases her up. Hey? Little 
old sanitary, ameliorating, lest-we-forget Booze. Say 
this job's off 'scuse me get on your clothes and 
let's go out and have some. 'Scuse the liberty, but 
ouch! There she goes again!" 

"For a week," said the citizen. " I haven't been able 
to dress myself without help. I'm afraid Thomas is 
in bed, and " 

"Climb out," said the burglar, "I'll help you get 
into your duds." 

The conventional returned as a tidal wave and 
flooded the citizen. He stroked his brown-and-gray 
beard. 

"It's very unusual" he began. 

"Here's your shirt," said the burglar, "fall out. I 
knew a man who said Omberry's Ointment fixed him 
in two weeks so he could use both hands in tying his 
four-in-hand." 

As they were going out the door the citizen turned 
and started back. 

" 'Liked to forgot my money," he explained; "laid 
it on the dresser last night." 

The burglar caught him by the right sleeve. 

"Come on," he said bluffly. "I ask you. Leave it 
alone. I've got the price. Ever try witch hazel 
and oil of wintergreen? " 



IX 
AT ARMS WITH MORPHEUS 

1 NEVER could quite understand how Tom Hopkins 
came to make that blunder, for he had been through 
a whole term at a medical college before he inherited 
his aunt's fortune and had been considered strong 
in therapeutics. 

We had been making a call together that evening, 
and afterward Tom ran up to my rooms for a pipe 
and a chat before going on to his own luxurious apart- 
ments. I had stepped into the other room for a 
moment when I heard Tom sing out: 

"Oh, Billy, I'm going to take about four grains of 
quinine, if you don't mind I'm feeling all blue and 
shivery. Guess I'm taking cold." 

"All right," I called back. "The bottle is on the 
second shelf. Take it in a spoonful of that elixir 
of eucalyptus. It knocks the bitter out." 

After I came back we sat by the fire and got our 
briars going. In about eight minutes Tom sank back 
into a gentle collapse. 

I went straight to the medicine cabinet and 
looked. 

88 



At Arms with Morpheus 89 

"You unmitigated hayseed!" I growled. "See 
what money will do for a man's brains!" 

There stood the morphine bottle with the stopple 
out, just as Tom had left it. 

I routed out another young M.D. who roomed on the 
floor above, and sent him for old Doctor Gales, two 
squares away. Tom Hopkins has too much money 
to be attended by rising young practitioners alone. 

When Gales came we put Tom through as expensive 
a course of treatment as the resources of the profession 
permit. After the more drastic remedies we gave him 
citrate of caffeine in frequent doses and strong coffee, 
and walked him up and down the floor between two of 
us. Old Gales pinched him and slapped his face and 
worked hard for the big check he could see in the 
distance. The young M.D. from the next floor 
gave Tom a most hearty, rousing kick, and then 
apologized to me. 

"Couldn't help it," he said. "I never kicked a 
millionaire before in my life. I may never have 
another opportunity." 

"Now," said Doctor Gales, after a couple of hours, 
** he'll do. But keep him awake for another hour. 
You can do that by talking to him and shaking him 
up occasionally. When his pulse and respiration 
are normal then let him sleep. I'll leave him with 
you now.'* 

I was left alone with Tom, whom we had laid on ? 



90 Sixes and Sevens 

couch. He lay very still, and his eyes were half closed. 
I began my work of keeping him awake. 

"Well, old man," I said, "you've had a narrow 
squeak, but we've pulled you through. When you 
were attending lectures, Tom, didn't any of the pro- 
fessors ever casually remark that m-o-r-p-h-i-a never 
spells 'quinia,' especially in four-grain doses? But I 
won't pile it up on you until you get on your feet. 
But you ought to have been a druggist, Tom; you're 
splendidly qualified to fill prescriptions." 

Tom looked at me with a faint and foolish smile. 
"B'ly," he murmured, "I feel jus' like a hum'n 
bird flyin' around a jolly lot of most 'shpensive roses. 
Don' bozzer me. Goin' sleep now." 

And he went to sleep in two seconds. I shook him 
by the shoulder. 

"Now, Tom," I said, severely, "this won't do. The 
big doctor said you must stay awake for at least an 
hour. Open your eyes. You're not entirely safe yet, 
you know. Wake up." 

Tom Hopkins weighs one hundred and ninety-eight. 
He gave me another somnolent grin, and fell into 
deeper slumber. I would have made him move about, 
but I might as well have tried to make Cleopatra's 
needle waltz around the room with me. Tom's 
breathing became stertorous, and that, in connection 
with morphia poisoning, means danger. 

Then I began to think. I could not rouse his body; 



At Arms with Morpheus 91 

I must strive to excite his mind. "Make him angry," 
was an idea that suggested itself. "Good!" I 
thought; but how? There was not a joint in 
Tom's armour. Dear old fellow! He was good 
nature itself, and a gallant gentleman, fine and true 
and clean as sunlight. He came from somewhere 
down South, where they still have ideals and a code. 
New York had charmed, but had not spoiled, him. 
He had that old-fashioned, chivalrous reverence for 
women, that Eureka! there was my idea! I 
worked the thing up for a minute or two in my imagi- 
nation. I chuckled to myself at the thought of spring- 
ing a thing like that on old Tom Hopkins. Then I 
took him by the shoulder and shook him till his ears 
flopped. He opened his eyes lazily. I assumed an 
expression of scorn and contempt, and pointed my 
finger within two inches of his nose. 

"Listen to me, Hopkins," I said, in cutting and 
distinct tones, "you and I have been good friends, but 
I want you to understand that in the future my doors 
are closed against any man who acts as much like a 
scoundrel as you have." 

Tom looked the least bit interested. 

"What's the matter, Billy?" he muttered, com- 
posedly. ' ' Don't your clothes fit you ? ' ' 

"If I were in your place," I went on, "which, thank 
God, I am not, I think I would be afraid to close my 
eyes. How about that girl you left waiting for you 



92 Sixes and Sevens 

down among those lonesome Southern pines the 
girl that you've forgotten since you came into your 
confounded money? Oh, I know what I'm talking 
about. While you were a poor medical student she 
was good enough for you. But now, since you are a 
millionaire, it's different. I wonder what she thinks 
of the performances of that peculiar class of people 
which she has been taught to worship the Southern 
gentlemen? I'm sorry, Hopkins, that I was forced 
to speak about these matters, but you've covered it 
up so well and played your part so nicely that I would 
have sworn you were above such unmanly tricks " 

Poor Tom. I could scarcely keep from laughing 
outright to see him struggling against the effects of 
the opiate. He was distinctly angry, and I didn't 
blame him. Tom had a Southern temper. His 
eyes were open now, and they showed a gleam or two 
of fire. But the drug still clouded his mind and bound 
his tongue. 

"C-c-confound you," he stammered, "I'll s-smash 
you." 

He tried to rise from the couch. With all his size 
he was very weak now. I thrust him back with one 
arm. He lay there glaring like a lion in a trap. 

"That will hold you for a while, you old loony," 
I said to myself. I got up and lit my pipe, for I was 
needing a smoke. I walked around a bit, congratu- 
lating myself on my brilliant idea. 



At Arms with Morpheus 93 

I heard a snore. I locked around. Tom was asleep 
again. I walked over and punched him on the jaw. 
He looked at me as pleasant and ungrudging as an 
idiot. I chewed my pipe and gave it to him hard. 

"I want you to recover yourself and get out of my 
rooms as soon as you can," I said, insultingly. "I've 
told you what I think of you. If you have any honour 
or honesty left you will think twice before you at- 
tempt again to associate with gentlemen. She's a 
poor girl, isn't she?" I sneered. "Somewhat too plain 
and unfashionable for us since we got our money. Be 
ashamed to walk on Fifth Avenue with her, wouldn't 
you? Hopkins, you're forty-seven times worse than 
a cad. Who cares for your money? I don't. I'll 
bet that girl don't. Perhaps if you didn't have it 
you'd be more of a man. As it is you've made a cur 
of yourself, and" I thought that quite dramatic 
"perhaps broken a faithful heart." (Old Tom Hop- 
kins breaking a faithful heart!) "Let me be rid of 
you as soon as possible." 

I turned my back on Tom, and winked at myself in 
a mirror. I heard him moving, and I turned again 
quickly. I didn't want a hundred and ninety-eight 
pounds falling on me from the rear. But Tom had 
only turned partly over, and laid one arm across his 
face. He spoke a few words rather more distinctly 
than before. 

"I couldn't have talked this way to you, Billy, 



94 Sixes and Sevens 

even if I'd heard people lyin' 'bout you. But jus* 
soon's I can s-stand up I'll break your neck 
don' f'get it." 

I did feel a little ashamed then. But it was to save 
Tom. In the morning, when I explained it, we would 
have a good laugh over it together. 

In about twenty minutes Tom dropped into a sound, 
easy slumber. I felt his pulse, listened to his respira- 
tion, and let him sleep. Everything was normal, and 
Tom was safe. I went into the other room and 
tumbled into bed. 

I found Tom up and dressed when I awoke the next 
morning. He was entirely himself again with the excep- 
tion of shaky nerves and a tongue like a white-oak chip. 

"What an idiot I was," he said, thoughtfully. "I 
remember thinking that quinine bottle looked queer 
while I was taking the dose. Have much trouble 
in bringing me 'round?" 

I told him no. His memory seemed bad about the 
entire affair. I concluded that he had no recollection 
of my efforts to keep him awake, and decided not to 
enlighten him. Some other time, I thought, when he 
was feeling better, we would have some fun over it. 

When Tom was ready to go he stopped, with the 
door open, and shook my hand. 

" Much obliged,old fellow," he said, quietly," for tak- 
ing so much trouble with me and for what you said. 
I'm going down now to telegraph to the little girl." 



A GHOST OF A CHANCE 

"ACTUALLY, a hod!" repeated Mrs. Kinsolving, 
pathetically. 

Mrs. Bellamy Bellmore arched a sympathetic 
eyebrow. Thus she expressed condolence and a 
generous amount of apparent surprise. 

"Fancy her telling everywhere," recapitulated Mrs. 
Kinsolving, "that she saw a ghost in the apartment 
she occupied here our choicest guest-room a 
ghost, carrying a hod on its shoulder the ghost of 
an old man in overalls, smoking a pipe and carrying 
a hod! The very absurdity of the thing shows her 
malicious intent. There never was a Kinsolving that 
carried a hod. Every one knows that Mr. Kinsolving's 
father accumulated his money by large building con- 
tracts, but he never worked a day with his own hands. 
He had this house built from his own plans; but 
oh, a hod! Why need she have been so cruel 
and malicious?" 

"It is really too bad," murmured Mrs. Bellmore, 
with an approving glance of her fine eyes about the 
vast chamber done in lilac and old gold. "And it 

95 



96 Sixes and Sevens 

was in this room she saw it! Oh, no, I'm not afraid 
of ghosts. Don't have the least fear on my account. 
I'm glad you put me in here. I think family ghosts 
so interesting ! But, really, the story does sound a little 
inconsistent. I should have expected something better 
from Mrs. Fischer-Suympkins. Don't they carry 
bricks in hods? Why should a ghost bring bricks into 
a villa built of marble and stone? I'm so sorry, but 
it makes me think that age is beginning to tell upon 
Mrs. Fischer-Suympkins." 

"This house," continued Mrs. Kinsolving, "was 
built upon the site of an old one used by the family 
during the Revolution. There wouldn't be anything 
strange in its having a ghost. And there was a Captain 
Kinsolving who fought in General Greene's army, 
though we've never been able to secure any papers to 
vouch for it. If there is to be a family ghost, why 
couldn't it have been his, instead of a bricklayer's?" 

"The ghost of a Revolutionary ancestor wouldn't 
be a bad idea," agreed Mrs. Bellmore; "but you know 
how arbitrary and inconsiderate ghosts can be. May- 
be, like love, they are * engendered in the eye.' One 
advantage of those who see ghosts is that their stories 
can't be disproved. By a spiteful eye, a Revolu- 
tionary knapsack might easily be construed to be a hod. 
Dear Mrs. Kinsolving, think no more of it. I am sure 
it was a knapsack." 

"But she told everybody!" mourned Mrs. Kin- 



A Ghost of a Chance 97 

solving, inconsolable. "She insisted upon the details. 
There is the pipe. And how are you going to get out 
of the overalls?" 

"Shan't get into them," said Mrs. Bellmore, with 
a prettily suppressed yawn; "too stiff and wrinkly. 
Is that you, Felice? Prepare my bath, please. Do 
you dine at seven at Clifftop, Mrs. Kinsolving? 
So kind of you to run in for a chat before dinner! I 
love those little touches of informality with a guest. 
They give such a home flavour to a visit. So sorry; 
I must be dressing. I am so indolent I always post- 
pone it until the last moment." 

Mrs. Fischer-Suympkins had been the first large 
plum that the Kinsolvings had drawn from the social 
pie. For a long time, the pie itself had been out of 
reach on a top shelf. But the purse and the pursuit 
had at last lowered it. Mrs. Fischer-Suympkins 
was the heliograph of the smart society parading corps. 
The glitter of her wit and actions passed along the 
line, transmitting whatever was latest and most daring 
in the game of peep-show. Formerly, her fame and 
leadership had been secure enough not to need the 
support of such artifices as handing around live frogs 
for favours at a cotillon. But, now, these things were 
necessary to the holding of her throne. Beside, 
middle age had come to preside, incongruous, at her 
capers. The sensational papers had cut her space 
from a page to two columns. Her wit developed 



98 Sixes and Sevens 

a sting; her manners became more rough and incon- 
siderate, as if she felt the royal necessity of estab- 
lishing her autocracy by scorning the conventionalities 
that bound lesser potentates. 

To some pressure at the command of the Kin- 
solvings, she had yielded so far as to honour their house 
by her presence, for an evening and night. She had 
her revenge upon her hostess by relating, with grim 
enjoyment and sarcastic humour, her story of the 
vision carrying the hod. To that lady, in raptures 
at having penetrated thus far toward the coveted inner 
circle, the result came as a crushing disappointment. 
Everybody either sympathized or laughed, and there 
was little to choose between the two modes of 
expression. 

But, later on, Mrs. Kinsolving's hopes and spirits 
were revived by the capture of a second and greater 
prize. 

Mrs. Bellamy Bellmore had accepted an invitation 
to visit at Clifftop, and would remain for three days. 
Mrs. Bellmore was one of the younger matrons, whose 
beauty, descent, and wealth gave her a reserved seat 
in the holy of holies that required no strenuous bolster- 
ing. She was generous enough thus to give Mrs. 
Kinsolving the accolade that was so poignantly 
desired; and, at the same time,, she thought how much 
it would please Terence. Perhaps it would end by 
solving him. 



A Ghost of a Chance 99 

Terence was Mrs. Kinsolving's son, aged twenty- 
nine, quite good-looking enough, and with two or 
three attractive and mysterious traits. For one, 
he was very devoted to his mother, and that was 
sufficiently odd to deserve notice. For others, he 
talked so little that it was irritating, and he seemed 
either very shy or very deep. Terence interested Mrs. 
Bellmore, because she was not sure which it was. 
She intended to study him a little longer, unless she 
forgot the matter. If he was only shy, she would 
abandon him, for shyness is a bore. If he was deep, 
she would also abandon him, for depth is precarious. 

On the afternoon of the third day of her visit, 
Terence hunted up Mrs. Bellmore, and found her in a 
nook actually looking at an album. 

"It's so good of you," said he,"to come down here 
and retrieve the day for us. I suppose you have heard 
that Mrs. Fischer-Suy napkins scuttled the ship before 
she left. She knocked a whole plank out of the bottom 
with a hod. My mother is grieving herself ill about 
it. Can't you manage to see a ghost for us while you 
are here, Mrs. Bellmore a bang-up, swell ghost, 
with a coronet on his head and a cheque book under 
his arm?" 

"That was a naughty old lady, Terence," said Mrs. 
Bellmore, "to tell such stories. Perhaps you gave her 
too much supper. Your mother doesn't really take 
it seriously, does she?" 



100 Sixes and Sevens 

"I think she does," answered Terence. "One 
would think every brick in the hod had dropped on 
her. It's a good mammy, and I don't like to see her 
worried. It's to be hoped that the ghost belongs 
to the hod-carriers' union, and will go out on a 
strike. If he doesn't, there will be no peace in this 
family." 

"I'm sleeping in the ghost-chamber," said Mrs. 
Bellmore, pensively. "But it's so nice I wouldn't 
change it, even if I were afraid, which I'm not. It 
wouldn't do for me to submit a counter story of a 
desirable, aristocratic shade, would it? I would do 
so, with pleasure, but it seems to me it would be too 
obviously an antidote for the other narrative to be 
effective." 

"True," said Terence, running two fingers thought- 
fully into his crisp, brown hair; "that would never do. 
How would it work to see the same ghost again, minus 
the overalls, and have gold bricks in the hod? That 
would elevate the spectre from degrading toil to a 
financial plane. Don't you think that would be re- 
spectable enough? " 

"There was an ancestor who fought against the 
Britishers, wasn't there? Your mother said some- 
thing to that effect." 

"I believe so; one of those old chaps in raglan vests 
and golf trousers. I don't care a continental for a 
Continental, myself. But the mother has set her 



A Ghost of a Chance 101 

heart on pomp and heraldry and pyrotechnics, and 
I want her to be happy." 

"You are a good boy, Terence," said Mrs. Bellmore, 
sweeping her silks close to one side of her, "not to 
beat your mother. Sit here by me, and let's look at 
the album, just as people used to do twenty years 
ago. Now, tell me about every one of them. Who 
is this tall, dignified gentleman leaning against the 
horizon, with one arm on the Corinthian column?" 

"That old chap with the big feet? " inquired Terence, 
craning his neck. "That's great-uncle O'Brannigan. 
He used to keep a rathskeller on the Bowery." 

"I asked you to sit down, Terence. If you are not 
going to amuse, or obey, me, I shall report in the 
morning that I saw a ghost wearing an apron and 
carrying schooners of beer. Now, that is better. To 
be shy, at your age, Terence, is a thing that you should 
blush to acknowledge." 

At breakfast on the last morning of her visit, Mrs. 
Bellmore startled and entranced every one present 
by announcing positively that she had seen the ghost. 

"Did it have a a a ?" Mrs. Kinsolving, 
in her suspense and agitation, could not bring out the 
word. 

"No, indeed far from it." 

There was a chorus of questions from others at the 
table. "Weren't you frightened?" "What did it 



102 Sixes and Sevens 

do?" "How did it look?" "How was it dressed?" 
"Did it say anything?" "Didn't you scream?" 

"I'll try to answer everything at once," said Mrs. 
Bellmore, heroically, "although I'm frightfully hungry. 
Something awakened me I'm not sure whether 
it was a noise or a touch and there stood the phan- 
tom. I never burn a light at night, so the room was 
quite dark, but I saw it plainly. I wasn't dreaming. 
It was a tall man, all misty white from head to foot. 
It wore the full dress of the old Colonial days 
powdered hair, baggy coat skirts, lace ruffles, and a 
sword. It looked intangible and luminous in the dark, 
and moved without a sound. Yes, I was a little 
frightened at first or startled, I should say. It 
was the first ghost I had ever seen. No, it didn't say 
anything. I didn't scream. I raised up on my elbow, 
and then it glided silently away, and disappeared 
when it reached the door." 

Mrs. Kinsolving was in the seventh heaven. "The 
description is that of Captain Kinsolving, of General 
Greene's army, one of our ancestors," she said, in a 
voice that trembled with pride and relief. "I really 
think I must apologize for our ghostly relative, Mrs. 
Bellmore. I am afraid he must have badly disturbed 
your rest." 

Terence sent a smile of pleased congratulation toward 
his mother. Attainment was Mrs. Kinsolving's, 
at last, and he loved to see her happy. 



A Ghost of a Chance 103 

"I suppose I ought to be ashamed to confess," said 
Mrs. Bellmore, who was now enjoying her breakfast, 
"that I wasn't very much disturbed. I presume it 
would have been the customary thing to scream and 
faint, and have all of you running about in picturesque 
costumes. But, after the first alarm was over, I 
really couldn't work myself up to a panic. The ghost 
retired from the stage quietly and peacefully, after 
doing its little turn, and I went to sleep again." 

Nearly all listened, politely accepted Mrs. Bellmore's 
story as a made-up affair, charitably offered as an 
offset to the unkind vision seen by Mrs. Fischer- 
Suympkins. But one or two present perceived that 
her assertions bore the genuine stamp of her own 
convictions. Truth and candour seemed to attend 
upon every word. Even a scoffer at ghosts if 
he were very observant would have been forced 
to admit that she had, at least in a very vivid dream, 
been honestly aware of the weird visitor. 

Soon Mrs. Bellmore's maid was packing. In two 
hours the auto would come to convey her to the 
station. As Terence was strolling upon the east 
piazza, Mrs. Bellmore came up to him, with a con- 
fidential sparkle in her eye. 

"I didn't wish to tell the others all of it," she said, 
"but I will tell you. In a way, I think you should 
be held responsible. Can you guess in what manner 
that ghost awakened me last night?" 



104 Sixes and Sevens 

"Rattled chains," suggested Terence, after some 
thought, "or groaned? They usually do one or th 
other." 

"Do you happen to know," continued Mrs. Bell- 
more, with sudden irrelevancy, "if I resemble any one 
of the female relatives of your restless ancestor, 
Captain Kinsolving?" 

"Don't think so," said Terence, with an extremely 
puzzled air. "Never heard of any of them being 
noted beauties." 

"Then, why," said Mrs. Bellmore, looking the 
young man gravely in the eye, "should that ghost 
have kissed me, as I'm sure it did?" 

"Heavens!" exclaimed Terence, in wide-eyed amaze- 
ment; "you don't mean that, Mrs. Bellmore! Did 
he actually kiss you?" 

"I said it," corrected Mrs. Bellmore. "I hope the 
impersonal pronoun is correctly used." 

"But why did you say I was responsible?" 

"Because you* are the only living male relative of 
the ghost." 

"I see. 'Unto the third and fourth generation.' 
But, seriously, did he did it how do you 

"Know? How does any one know? I was asleep, 
and that is what awakened me, I'm almost certain." 

"Almost?" 

" Well, I awoke just as oh, can't you understand 
what I mean? When anything arouses you suddenly, 



A Ghost of a Chance 105 

you are not positive whether you dreamed, or and 
yet you know that Dear me, Terence, must I 
dissect the most elementary sensations in order to 
accommodate your extremely practical intelligence?" 

"But, about kissing ghosts, you know," said Terence, 
humbly, "I require the most primary instruction. 
I never kissed a ghost. Is it is it ? " 

"The sensation," said Mrs. Bellmore, with deliber- 
ate, but slightly smiling, emphasis, "since you are 
seeking instruction, is a mingling of the material and 
the spiritual." 

"Of course," said Terence, suddenly growing serious, 
"it was a dream or some kind of an hallucination. 
Nobody believes in spirits, these days. If you told 
the tale out of kindness of heart, Mrs. Bellmore, I 
can't express how grateful I am to you. It has made 
my mother supremely happy. That Revolutionary 
ancestor was a stunning idea." 

Mrs. Bellmore sighed. "The usual fate of ghost- 
seers is mine," she said, resignedly. "My privileged 
encounter with a spirit is attributed to lobster salad 
or mendacity. Well, I have, at least, one memory 
left from the wreck a kiss from the unseen world. 
Was Captain Kinsolving a very brave man, do you 
know, Terence?" 

"He was licked at Yorktown, I believe," said 
Terence, reflecting. "They say he skedaddled with 
his company, after the first battle there." 



106 Sixes and Sevens 

"I thought he must have been timid," said Mrs. 
Bellmore, absently. "He might have had another." 

"Another battle?" asked Terence, dully. 

"What else could I mean? I must go and get 
ready now; the auto will be here in an hour. I've 
enjoyed Clifftop immensely. Such a lovely morning, 
isn't it, Terence?" 

On her way to the station, Mrs. Bellmore took 
from her bag a silk handkerchief, and looked at it 
with a little peculiar smile. Then she tied it hi sev- 
eral very hard knots, and threw it, at a convenient 
moment, over the edge of the cliff along which the 
road ran. 

In his room, Terrence was giving some directions 
to his man, Brooks. "Have this stuff done up in 
a parcel," he said, "and ship it to the address on 
that card." 

The card was that of a New York costumer. The 
"stuff" was a gentleman's costume of the days of 
'76, made of white satin, with silver buckles, white 
silk stockings, and white kid shoes. A powdered wig 
and a sword completed the dress. 

"And look about, Brooks," added Terence, a little 
anxiously, "for a silk handkerchief with my initials 
in one corner. I must have dropped it somewhere." 

It was a month later when Mrs. Bellmore and one 
or two others of the smart crowd were making up a 
list of names for a coaching trip through the Catskills. 



A Ghost of a Chance 107 

Mrs. Bellmore looked over the list for a final censoring. 
The name of Terence Kinsolving was there. Mrs. 
Bellmore ran her prohibitive pencil lightly through 
the name. 

"Too shy!" she murmured, sweetly, in explanation. 



XI 

JIMMY HAYES AND MURIEL 

I 

SUPPER was over, and there had fallen upon the 
camp the silence that accompanies the rolling of 
corn-husk cigarettes. The water hole shone from the 
dark earth like a patch of fallen sky. Coyotes yelped. 
Dull thumps indicated the rocking-horse movements 
of the hobbled ponies as they moved to fresh grass. 
A half -troop of the Frontier Battalion of Texas Rangers 
were distributed about the fire. 

A well-known sound the fluttering and scraping 
of chaparral against wooden stirrups came from 
the thick brush above the camp. The rangers listened 
cautiously. They heard a loud and cheerful voice 
call out reassuringly: 

"Brace up, Muriel, old girl, we're 'most there now! 
Been a long ride for ye, ain't it, ye old antediluvian 
handful of animated carpet-tacks? Hey, now, quit 
a tryin' to kiss me! Don't hold on to my neck so 
tight this here paint hoss ain't any too shore-footed, 
let me tell ye. He's liable to dump us both off if 
we don't watch out." 

108 



Jimmy Hayes and Muriel 109< 

Two minutes of waiting brought a tired "paint" 
pony single-footing into camp. A gangling youth 
of twenty lolled in the saddle. Of the "Muriel" 
whom he had been addressing, nothing was to be seen. 

"Hi, fellows!" shouted the rider cheerfully. "This 
here's a letter fer Lieutenant Manning." 

He dismounted, unsaddled, dropped the coils of 
his stake-rope, and got his hobbles from the saddle- 
horn. While Lieutenant Manning, in command, was 
reading the letter, the newcomer, rubbed solici- 
tously at some dried mud in the loops of the hobbles, 
showing a consideration for the forelegs of his mount> 

"Boys," said the lieutenant, waving his hand to the 
rangers," this is Mr. James Hayes. He's a new member 
of the company. Captain McLean sends him down 
from El Paso. The boys will see that you have some 
supper, Hayes, as soon as you get your pony hobbled." 

The recruit was received cordially by the rangers. 
Still, they observed him shrewdly and with suspended 
judgment. Picking a comrade on the border is done 
with ten times the care and discretion with which a 
girl chooses a sweetheart. On your "side-kicker's" 
nerve, loyalty, aim, and coolness your own life may 
depend many times. 

After a hearty supper Hayes joined the smokers 
about the fire. His appearance did not settle all the 
questions in the minds of his brother rangers. They 
saw simply a loose, lank youth with tow-coloured,. 



110 Sixes and Sevens 

sun-burned hair and a berry -brown, ingenuous face 
that wore a quizzical, good-natured smile. 

"Fellows," said the new ranger, "I'm goin' to inter- 
duce to you a lady friend of mine. Ain't ever heard 
anybody call her a beauty, but you'll all admit she's 
got some fine points about her. Come along, Muriel ! " 

He held open the front of his blue flannel shirt. 
Out of it crawled a horned frog. A bright red ribbon 
was tied jauntily around its spiky neck. It crawled 
to its owner's knee and sat there, motionless. 

"This here Muriel," said Hayes, with an oratorical 
wave of his hand, "has got qualities. She nevei 
talks back, she always stays at home, and she's satis- 
fied with one red dress for every day and Sunday, too." 

"Look at that blame insect!" said one of the rangers 
with a grin. "I've seen plenty of them horny frogs, 
but I never knew anybody to have one for a side- 
partner. Does the blame thing know you from any- 
body else?" 

"Take it over there and see," said Hayes. 

The stumpy little lizard known as the horned frog 
is harmless. He has the hideousness of the prehistoric 
monsters whose reduced descendant he is, but he is 
gentler than the dove. 

The ranger took Muriel from Hayes's knee and went 
back to his seat on a roll of blankets. The captive 
twisted and clawed and struggled vigorously in his 
hand. After holding it for a moment or two, the 



Jimmy Hayes and Muriel 111 

ranger set it upon the ground. Awkwardly, but swiftly 
the frog worked its four oddly moving legs until it 
stopped close by Hayes's foot. 

" Well, dang my hide ! " said the other ranger. " The 
little cuss knows you. Never thought them insects 
had that much sense ! " 



II 

JIMMY HAYES became a favourite in the ranger camp. 
He had an endless store of good-nature, and a mild, 
perennial quality of humour that is well adapted to 
camp life. He was never without his horned frog. 
In the bosom of his shirt during rides, on I. 's knee or 
shoulder in camp, under his blankets at night, the ugly 
little beast never left him. 

Jimmy was a humourist of a type that prevails 
in the rural South and West. Unskilled in originating 
methods of amusing or in witty conceptions, he had 
hit upon a comical idea and clung to it reverently. 
It had seemed to Jimmy a very funny thing to have 
about his person, with which to amuse his friends, a 
tame horned frog with a red ribbon around its neck. 
As it was a happy idea, why not perpetuate it? 

The sentiments existing between Jimmy and the 
frog cannot be exactly determined. The capability 
of the horned frog for lasting affection is a subject 
upon which we have had no symposiums. It is easier 



112 Sixes and Sevens 

to guess Jimmy's feelings. Muriel was his chef 
d'fuvre of wit, and as such he cherished her. He 
caught flies for her, and shielded her from sudden 
northers. Yet his care was half selfish, and when the 
time came she repaid him a thousand fold. Other 
Muriels have thus overbalanced the light attentions 
of other Jimmies. 

Not at once did Jimmy Hayes attain full brother- 
hood with his comrades. They loved him for his sim- 
plicity and drollness, but there hung above him a great 
sword of suspended judgment. To make merry in 
camp is not all of a ranger's life. There are horse- 
thieves to trail, desperate criminals to run down, 
bravos to battle with, bandits to rout out of the 
chaparral, peace and order to be compelled at the 
muzzle of a six-shooter. Jimmy had been "'most 
generally a cow-puncher," he said; he was inex- 
perienced in ranger methods of warfare. Therefore the 
rangers speculated apart and solemnly as to how he 
would stand fire. For, let it be known, the honour and 
pride of each ranger company is the individual 
bravery of its members. 

For two months the border was quiet. The rangers 
lolled, listless, in camp. And then bringing joy 
to the rusting guardians of the frontier Sebastiano 
Saldar, an eminent Mexican desperado and cattle- 
thief, crossed the Rio Grande with his gang and began 
to lay waste the Texas side. There were indications 



Jimmy Hayes and Muriel 113 

that Jimmy Hayes would soon have the opportunity to 
show his mettle. The rangers patrolled with alacrity, 
but Saldar's men were mounted like Lochinvar, and 
were hard to catch. 

One evening, about sundown, the rangers halted 
for supper after a long ride. Their horses stood 
panting, with their saddles on. The men were frying 
bacon and boiling coffee. Suddenly, out of the brush, 
Sebastiano Saldar and his gang dashed upon them with 
blazing six-shooters and high-voiced yells. It was 
a neat surprise. The rangers swore in annoyed tones, 
and got their Winchesters busy; but the attack was 
only a spectacular dash of the purest Mexican type. 
After the florid demonstration the raiders galloped 
away, yelling, down the river. The rangers mounted 
and pursued; but in less than two miles the fag- 
ged ponies laboured so that Lieutenant Manning 
gave the word to abandon the chase and return to 
the camp. 

Then it was discovered that Jimmy Hayes was 
missing. Some one remembered having seen him run 
for his pony when the attack began, but no one had 
set eyes on him since. Morning came, but no Jimmy. 
They searched the country around, on the theory 
that he had been killed or wounded, but without suc- 
cess. Then they followed after Saldar's gang, but it 
seemed to have disappeared. Manning concluded 
that the wily Mexican had recrossed the river after 



114 Sixes and Sevens 

his theatric farewell. And, indeed, no further 
depredations from him were reported. 

This gave the rangers time to nurse a soreness they 
had. As has been said, the pride and honour of the 
company is the individual bravery of its members. 
And now they believed that Jimmy Hayes had turned 
coward at the whiz of Mexican bullets. There was 
no other deduction. Buck Davis pointed out that not 
a shot was fired by Saldar's gang after Jimmy was 
seen running for his horse. There was no way for 
him to have been shot. No, he had fled from his first 
fight, and afterward he would not return, aware 
that the scorn of his comrades would be a worse thing 
to face than the muzzles of many rifles. 

So Manning's detachment of McLean's company, 
Frontier Battalion, was gloomy. It was the first 
blot on its escutcheon. Never before in the history 
of the service had a ranger shown the white feather. 
All of them had liked Jimmy Hayes, and that made 
it worse. 

Days, weeks, and months went by, and still that 
little cloud of unforgotten cowardice hung above 
the camp. 



Ill 



NEARLY a year afterward after many camping 
grounds and many hundreds of miles guarded and 



Jimmy Hayes and Muriel 115 

defended Lieutenant Manning, with almost the 
same detachment of men, was sent to a point only a 
few miles below their old camp on the river to look 
after some smuggling there. One afternoon, while 
they were riding through a dense mesquite flat, they 
came upon a patch of open hog-wallow prairie. There 
they rode upon the scene of an unwritten tragedy. 

In a big hog-wallow lay the skeletons of three 
Mexicans. Their clothing alone served to identify 
them. The largest of the figures had once been 
Sebastiano Saldar. His great, costly sombrero, heavy 
with gold ornamentation a hat famous all along 
the Rio Grande lay there pierced by three bullets. 
AJong the ridge of the hog-wallow rested the rusting 
Winchesters of the Mexicans all pointing in the 
same direction. 

The rangers rode in that direction for fifty yards. 
There, in a little depression of the ground, with his 
rifle still bearing upon the three, lay another skeleton. 
It had been a battle of extermination. There was 
nothing to identify the solitary defender. His clothing 
such as the elements had left distinguishable 
seemed to be of the kind that any ranchman or cowboy 
might have worn. 

"Some cow-puncher," said Manning, "that they 
caught out alone. Good boy! He put up a dandy 
scrap before they got him. So that's why we didn't 
hear from Don Sebastiano any more!" 



116 Sixes and Sevens 

And then, from beneath the weather-beaten rags of 
the dead man, there wriggled out a horned frog with 
a faded red ribbon around its neck, and sat upon the 
shoulder of its long quiet master. Mutely it told the 
story of the untried youth and the swift "paint" 
pony how they had outstripped all their comrades 
that day in the pursuit of the Mexican raiders, and 
how the boy had gone down upholding the honour 
of the company. 

The ranger troop herded close, and a simultaneous 
wild yell arose from their lips. The outburst was at 
once a dirge, an apology, an epitaph, and a paean of 
triumph. A strange requiem, you may say, over the 
body of a fallen .comrade; but if Jimmy Hayes could 
have heard it he would have understood. 



XII 
THE DOOR OF UNREST 

I SAT an hour by sun, in the editor's room of the 
Montopolis Weekly Bugle. I was the editor. 

The saffron rays of the declining sunlight filtered 
through the cornstalks in Micajah Widdup's garden- 
patch, and cast an amber glory upon my paste-pot. 
I sat at the editorial desk in my non-rotary revolving 
chair, and prepared my editorial against the oligarchies. 
The room, with its one window, was already a prey 
to the twilight. One by one, with my trenchant 
sentences, I lopped off the heads of the political hydra, 
while I listened, full of kindly peace, to the home-com- 
ing cow-bells and wondered what Mrs. Flanagan was 
going to have for supper. 

Then in from the dusky, quiet street there drifted 
and perched himself upon a corner of my desk old 
Father Time's younger brother. His face was beard- 
less and as gnarled as an English walnut. I never 
saw clothes such as he wore. They would have re- 
duced Joseph's coat to a monochrome. But the 
colours were not the dyer's. Stains and patches and 
the work of sun and rust were responsible for the 

117 



118 Sixes and Sevens 

diversity. On his coarse shoes was the dust, conceiv- 
ably, of a thousand leagues. I can describe him 
no further, except to say that he was little and 
weird and old old I began to estimate in cen- 
turies when I saw him. Yes, and I remember that 
there was an odour, a faint odour like aloes, or 
possibly like myrrh or leather; and I thought of 
museums. 

And then I reached for a pad and pencil, for bus- 
iness is business, and visits of the oldest inhabitants 
are sacred and honourable, requiring to be chronicled. 

"I am glad to see you, sir," I said. "I would offer 
you a chair, but you see, sir," I went on, "I have 
lived in Montopolis only three weeks, and I have not 
met many of our citizens." I turned a doubtful eye upon 
his dust-stained shoes, and concluded with a news- 
paper phrase, "I suppose that you reside in our 
midst?" 

My visitor fumbled in his raiment, drew forth a 
soiled card, and handed it to me. Upon it was written, 
in plain but unsteadily formed characters, the name 
"MichobAder." 

"I am glad you called, Mr. Ader," I said. "As 
one of our older citizens, you must view with pride 
the recent growth and enterprise of Montopolis. 
Among other improvements, I think I can promise 
that the town will now be provided with a live, enter- 
prising newspa ' 



The Door of Unrest 119 

"Do ye know the name on that card?" asked my 
caller, interrupting me. 

"It is not a familiar one to me," I said. 

Again he visited the depths of his ancient vestments. 
This time he brought out a torn leaf of some book or 
journal, brown and flimsy with age. The heading 
of the page was the Turkish Spy in old-style type; 
the printing upon it was this: 

"There is a man come to Paris in this year 1643 
who pretends to have lived these sixteen hundred years. 
He says of himself that he was a shoemaker in Jeru- 
salem at the time of the Crucifixion; that his name is 
Michob Ader; and that when Jesus, the Christian 
Messias, was condemned by Pontius Pilate, the 
Roman president, he paused to rest while bearing his 
cross to the place of crucifixion before the door of 
Michob Ader. The shoemaker struck Jesus with his 
fist, saying: 'Go; why tarriest thou?' The Messias 
answered him: 'I indeed am going; but thou shalt 
tarry until I come'; thereby condemning him to live 
until the day of judgment. He lives forever, but 
at the end of every hundred years he falls into a fit 
or trance, on recovering from which he finds himself 
in the same state of youth in which he was when 
Jesus suffered, being then about thirty years of age. 

"Such is the story of the Wandering Jew, as told by 

Michob Ader, who relates " Here the printing 

ended. 



120 Sixes and Sevens 

I must have muttered aloud something to myself 
about the Wandering Jew, for the old man spake up, 
bitterly and loudly. 

"'Tis a lie," said he, "like nine tenths of what ye 
call history. 'Tis a Gentile I am, and no Jew. I am 
after footing it out of Jerusalem, my son; but if that 
makes me a Jew, then everything that comes out of 
a bottle is babies' milk. Ye have my name on the 
card ye hold; and ye have read the bit of paper they 
call the Turkish Spy that printed the news when I 
stepped into their office on the 12th day of June, in 
the year 1643, just as I have called upon ye to-day." 

I laid down my pencil and pad. Clearly it would 
not do. Here was an item for the local column of 
the Bugle that but it would not do. Still, frag- 
ments of the impossible "personal" began to flit 
through my conventionalized brain. "Uncle Michob 
is as spry on his legs as a young chap of only a thousand 
or so." "Our venerable caller relates with pride 

that George Wash no, Ptolemy the Great once 

dandled him on his knee at his father's house." "Un- 
cle Michob says that our wet spring was nothing in 
comparison with the dampness that ruined the crops 

around Mount Ararat when he was a boy 

But no, no it would not do. 

I was trying to think of some conversational subject 
with which to interest my visitor, and was hesitating 
between walking matches and the Pliocene age, when 



The Door of Unrest 

the old man suddenly began to weep poignantly and 
distressfully. 

"Cheer up, Mr. Ader," I said, a little awkwardly; 
"this matter may blow over in a few hundred years 
more. There has already been a decided reaction 
in favour of Judas Iscariot and Colonel Burr and the 
celebrated violinist, Signer Nero. This is the age of 
whitewash. You must not allow yourself to become 
down-hearted." 

Unknowingly, I had struck a chord. The old man 
blinked belligerently through his senile tears. 

"Tis time," he said, "that the liars be doin' justice 
to somebody. Yer historians are no more than a 
pack of old women gabblin' at a wake. A finer man 
than the Imperor Nero niver wore sandals. Man, I 
was at the burnin' of Rome. I knowed the Imperor 
well, for in them days I was a well-known char-acter. 
In thim days they had rayspect for a man that lived 
forever. 

"But 'twas of the Imperor Nero I was goin' to tell 
ye. I struck into Rome, up the Appian Way, on the 
night of July the 16th, the year 64. I had just stepped 
down by way of Siberia and Afghanistan; and one 
foot of me had a frost-bite, and the other a blister 
burned by the sand of the desert; and I was feelin' a 
bit blue from doin' patrol duty from the North Pole 
down to the Last Chance corner in Patagonia, and 
bein' miscalled a Jew in the bargain. Well, I'm tellin' 



Sixes and Sevens 

ye I was passin' the Circus Maximus, and it was dark 
as pitch over the way, and then I heard somebody 
sing out, 'Is that you, Michob?' 

"Over ag'inst the wall, hid out amongst a pile of 
barrels and old dry-goods boxes, was the Imperor Nero 
wid his togy wrapped around his toes, smokin' a long, 
black segar. 
'""'Have one, Michob?' says he. 

" 'None of the weeds for me,' says I 'nayther pipe 
nor segar. What's the use,' says I, 'of smokin' when 
ye've not got the ghost of a chance of killin' yeself 
by doin' it?' 

"True for ye, Michob Ader, my perpetual Jew,' 
says the Imperor; 'ye're not always wandering. Sure, 
'tis danger gives the spice of our pleasures next to 
their bein' forbidden.' 

'"And for what,' says I, 'do ye smoke be night in 
dark places widout even a cinturion in plain clothes 
to attend ye?' 

" *Have ye ever heard, Michob,' says the Imperor, 
'of predestinarianism?' 

"'I've had the cousin of it,' says I. 'I've been on 
the trot with pedestrianism for many a year, and more 
to come, as ye well know.' 

" 'The longer word,' says me friend Nero, 'is the 
tachin' of this new sect of people they call the 
Christians. 'Tis them that's raysponsible for me 
smokin' be night in holes and corners of the dark.' 



The Door of Unrest 123 

"And then I sets down and takes off a shoe and rubs 
me foot that is frosted, and the Imperor tells me about 
it. It seems that since I passed that way before, the 
Imperor had mandamused the Impress wid a divorce 
suit, and Misses Poppsea, a cilibrated lady, was in- 
gaged, widout riferences, as housekeeper at the palace. 
'All in one day,' says the Imperor, 'she puts up new 
lace windy-curtains in the palace and joins the anti- 
tobacco society, and whin I feels the need of a smoke 
I must be after sneakin' out to these piles of lumber 
in the dark.' So there in the dark me and the Imperor 
sat, and I told him of me travels. And when they 
say the Imperor was an incindiary, they lie. 'Twas 
that night the fire started that burnt the city. "Tia 
my opinion that it began from a stump of segar that 
he threw down among the boxes. And 'tis a lie that 
he fiddled. He did all he could for six days to stop 
it, sir." 

And now I detected a new flavour to Mr. Michob 
Ader. It had not been myrrh or balm or hyssop that 
I had smelled. The emanation was the odour of bad 
whiskey and, worse still, of low comedy the sort 
that small humorists manufacture by clothing the 
grave and reverend things of legend and history in 
the vulgar, topical frippery that passes for a certain 
kind of wit. Michob Ader as an impostor, claiming nine- 
teen hundred years, and playing his part with the de- 
cency of respectable lunacy, I could endure; but as a 



124 Sixes and Sevens 

tedious wag, cheapening his egregious story with song- 
book levity, his importance as an entertainer grew less. 

And then, as if he suspected my thoughts, he sud- 
denly shifted his key. 

"You'll excuse me, sir," he whined, "but sometimes 
I get a little mixed in my head. I am a very old man; 
and it is hard to remember everything." 

I knew that he was right, and that I should not try 
to reconcile him with Roman history; so I asked for 
news concerning other ancients with whom he had 
walked familiar. 

Above my desk hung an engraving of Raphael's 
cherubs. You could yet make out their forms, though 
the dust blurred their outlines strangely. 

"Ye calls them 'cher-rubs'," cackled the old man. 
"Babes, ye fancy they are, with wings. And there's 
one wid legs and a bow and arrow that ye call Cupid 
I know where they was found. The great-great- 
great-grandfather of thim all was a billy-goat. Bein' 
an editor, sir, do ye happen to know where Solomon'* 
Temple stood?" 

I fancied that it was in in Persia? Well, I did 
not know. 

"'Tis not in history nor in the Bible where it was. 
But I saw it, meself . The first pictures of cher-rubs 
and cupids was sculptured upon thim walls and pillars. 
Two of the biggest, sir, stood in the adytum to form 
the baldachin over the Ark. But the wings of thim 



The Door of Unrest 125 

sculptures was intindid for horns. And the faces was 
the faces of goats. Ten thousand goats there was in 
and about the temple. And your cher-rubs was billy- 
goats in the days of King Solomon, but the painters 
misconstrued the horns into wings. 

"And I knew Tamerlane, the lame Timour, sir, 
very well. I saw him at Keghut and at Zaranj. 
He was a little man no larger than yerself , with hair 
the colour of an amber pipe stem. They buried him 
at Samarkand. I was at the wake, sir. Oh, he 
was a fine-built man in his coffin, six feet long, with 
black whiskers to his face. And I see 'em throw turnips 
at the Imperor Vispacian in Africa. All over the world 
I have tramped, sir, without the body of me findin' 
any rest. 'Twas so commanded. I saw Jerusalem 
destroyed, and Pompeii go up in the fireworks; and I 
was at the coronation of Charlemagne and the lynchin' 
of Joan of Arc. And everywhere I go there comes 
storms and revolutions and plagues and fires. 'Twas 
so commanded. Ye have heard of the Wandering 
Jew. 'Tis all so, except that divil a bit am I a Jew. 
But history lies, as I have told ye. Are ye quite sure, 
sir, that ye haven't a drop of whiskey convenient? Ye 
well know that I have many mil&s of walking 
before me." 

" I have none," said I, " and, if you please, I am about 
to leave for my supper." 

I pushed my chair back creakingly. This ancient 



126 Sixes and Sevens 

landlubber was becoming as great an affliction as any 
cross-bowed mariner. He shook a musty effluvium 
from his piebald clothes, overturned my inkstand, and 
went on with his insufferable nonsense. 

"I wouldn't mind it so much," he complained, "if 
it wasn't for the work I must do on Good Fridays. 
Ye know about Pontius Pilate, sir, of course. His 
body, whin he killed himself, was pitched into a lake 
on the Alps mountains. Now, listen to the job that 
'tis mine to perform on the night of ivery Good Friday. 
The ould divil goes down in the pool and drags up 
Pontius, and the water is bilin' and spewin' like a wash 
pot. And the ould divil sets the body on top of a 
throne on the rocks, and thin comes me share of the 
job. Oh, sir, ye would pity me thin ye would pray 
for the poor Wandering Jew that niver was a Jew if 
ye could see the horror of the thing that I must do. 
'Tis I that must fetch a bowl of water and kneel down 
before it till it washes its hands. I declare to ye that 
Pontius Pilate, a man dead two hundred years, dragged 
up with the lake slime coverin' him and fishes wrigglin' 
inside of him widout eyes, and in the discomposition of 
the body, sits there, sir, and washes his hands in the 
bowl I hold for him on Good Fridays. 'Twas so 
commanded." 

Clearly, the matter had progressed far beyond the 
scope of the Bugle's local column. There might have 
been employment here for the alienist or for those 



The Door of Unrest 127 

who circulate the pledge; but I had had enough of it. 
I got up, and repeated that I must go. 

At this he seized my coat, grovelled upon my desk, 
and burst again into distressful weeping. Whatever 
it was about, I said to myself that his grief was genuine. 

"Come now, Mr. Ader/' I said, soothingly; "what 
is the matter?" 

The answer came brokenly through his racking sobs: 
"Because I would not. . . let the poor Christ 
. . . rest. . . upon the step." 

His hallucination seemed beyond all reasonable 
answer; yet the effect of it upon him scarcely merited 
disrespect. But I knew nothing that might assuage it; 
and I told him once more that both of us should be 
leaving the office at once. 

Obedient at last, he raised himself from my dishev- 
elled desk, and permitted me to hah" lift him to the 
floor. The gale of his grief had blown away his words; 
his freshet of tears had soaked away the crust of his 
grief. Reminiscence died in him at least, the 
coherent part of it. 

"'Twas me that did it," he muttered, as I led him 
toward the door " me, the shoemaker of Jerusalem." 

I got him to the sidewalk, and in the augmented 
light I saw that his face was seared and lined and 
warped by a sadness almost incredibly the product of 
a single lifetime. 

And then high up in the firmamental darkness we 



128 Sixes and Sevens 

heard the clamant cries of some great, passing birds. 
My Wandering Jew lifted his hand, with side-tilted 
head. 

"The Seven Whistlers!" he said, as one introduces 
well-known friends. 

"Wild geese," said I; "but I confess that their num- 
ber is beyond me." 

"They follow me everywhere," he said. " 'Twas so 
commanded. What ye hear is the souls of the seven 
Jews that helped with the Crucifixion. Sometimes 
they're plovers and sometimes geese, but ye'll find 
them always flyin' where I go." 

I stood, uncertain how to take my leave. I looked 
down the street, shuffled my feet, looked back again 
and felt my hair rise. The old man had disappeared. 

And then my capillaries relaxed, for I dimly saw him 
footing it away through the darkness. But he walked 
so swiftly and silently and contrary to the gait prom- 
ised by his age that my composure was not all 
restored, though I knew not why. 

That night I was foolish enough to take down %ome 
dust-covered volumes from my modest shelves. I 
searched "Hermippus Rediwus" and "Salathiel" 
and the "Pepys Collection" in vain. And then in a 
book called "The Citizen of the World," and in one 
two centuries old, I came upon what I desired. Mi- 
chob Ader had indeed come to Paris in the year 1643, 
and related to the Turkish Spy an extraordinary 



The Door of Unrest 129 

story. He claimed to be the Wandering Jew, and 

t-ll fit 

But here I fell asleep, for my editorial duties had 
not been light that day. 

Judge Hoover was the Bugle's candidate for congress. 
Having to confer with him, I sought his home early 
the next morning; and we walked together down town 
through a little street with which I was unfamiliar. 

"Did you ever hear of Michob Ader?" I asked him, 
smiling. 

"Why, yes," said the judge. "And that reminds 
me of my shoes he has for mending. Here is his 
shop now." 

Judge Hoover stepped into a dingy, small shop. 
I looked up at the sign, and saw "Mike O'Bader, 
Boot and Shoe Maker," on it. Some wild geese 
passed above, honking clearly. I scratched my ear 
and frowned, and then trailed into the shop. 

There sat my Wandering Jew on his shoemaker's 
bench, trimming a half-sole. He was drabbled with 
dew,, grass-stained, unkempt, and miserable; and on 
his face was still the unexplained wretchedness, the 
problematic sorrow, the esoteric woe, that had been 
written there by nothing less, it seemed, than the sty- 
lus of the centuries. 

Judge Hoover inquired kindly concerning his shoes. 
The old shoemaker looked up, and spoke sanely enough. 
He had been ill, he said, for a few days. The next 



130 Sixes and Sevens 

day the shoes would be ready. He looked at me, and 
I could see that I had no place in his memory. So out 
we went, and on our way. 

"Old Mike," remarked the candidate, "has been on 
one of his sprees. He gets crazy drunk regularly once 
a month. But he's a good shoemaker." 

"What is his history?" I inquired. 

"Whiskey," epitomized Judge Hoover. "That 
explains him." 

I was silent, but I did not accept the explanation. 
And so, when I had the chance, I asked old man Sel- 
lers, who browsed daily on my exchanges. 

"Mike O'Bader," said he, "was makin' shoes in 
Montopolis when I come here goin' on fifteen year 
ago. I guess whiskey's his trouble. Once a month 
he gets off the track, and stays so a week. He's got 
a rigmarole somethin' about his bein' a Jew pedler 
that he tells ev'rybody. Nobody won't listen to him 
any more. When he's sober he ain't sich a fool 
he's got a sight of books in the back room of his shop 
that he reads. I guess you can lay all his trouble to 
whiskey." 

But again I would not. Not yet was my Wandering 
Jew rightly construed for me. I trust that women 
may not be allowed a title to all the curiosity in the 
world. So when Montopolis's oldest inhabitant (some 
ninety score years younger than Michob Ader) 
dropped in to acquire promulgation in print, I 



The Door of Unrest 131 

siphoned his perpetual trickle of reminiscence in 
the direction of the uninterpreted maker of shoes. 

Uncle Abner was the Complete History of Mon- 
topolis, bound in butternut. 

"O'Bader," he quavered, "come here in '69. He 
was the first shoemaker in the place. Folks generally 
considers him crazy at times now. But he don't 
harm nobody. I s'pose drinkin' upset his mind 
yes, drinkin' very likely done it. It's a powerful bad 
thing, drinkin'. I'm an old, old man, sir, and I never 
see no good in drinkin'." 

I felt disappointment. I was willing to admit drink 
in the case of my shoemaker, but I preferred it as a 
recourse instead of a cause. Why had he pitched upon 
his perpetual, strange note of the Wandering Jew? 
Why his unutterable grief during his aberration? 
I could not yet accept whiskey as an explanation. 

"Did Mike O'Bader ever have a great loss or trouble 
of any kind?" I asked. 

"Lemme see! About thirty year ago there was 
somethin' of the kind, I recollect. Montopolis, sir, 
in them days used to be a mighty strict place. 

"Well, Mike O'Bader had a daughter then a 
right pretty girl. She was too gay a sort for Montop- 
olis, so one day she slips off to another town and runs 
away with a circus. It was two years before she comes 
back, all fixed up in fine clothes and rings and jewellery, 
to see Mike. He wouldn't have nothin' to do with 



132 Sixes and Sevens 

her, so she stays around town awhile, anyway. I 
reckon the men folks wouldn't have raised no objec- 
tions, but the women egged 'em on to order her to 
leave town. But she had plenty of spunk, and told 
'em to mind their own business. 

"So one night they decided to run her away. A 
crowd of men and women drove her out of her house, 
and chased her with sticks and stones. She run to 
her father's door, callin' for help. Mike opens it, and 
when he sees who it is he hits her with his fist and 
knocks her down and shuts the door. 

"And then the crowd kept on chunkin' her till she 
run clear out of town. And the next day they finds 
her drowned dead in Hunter's mill pond. I mind it all 
now. That was thirty year ago." 

I leaned back in my non-rotary revolving chair and 
nodded gently, like a mandarin, at my paste-pot. 

"When old Mike has a spell," went on Uncle Abner, 
tepidly garrulous, "he thinks he's the Wanderin' 
Jew." 

"He is," said I, nodding away. 

And Uncle Abner cackled insinuatingly at the editor's 
remark, for he was expecting at least a "stickful" 
in the "Personal Notes" of the Bugle. 



xra 

THE DUPLICITY OF MARGRAVES 

WHEN Major Pendleton Talbot, of Mobile, sir, 
and his daughter, Miss Lydia Talbot, came to Wash- 
ington to reside, they selected for a boarding place a 
house that stood fifty yards back from one of the 
quietest avenues. It was an old-fashioned brick 
building, with a portico upheld by tall white pillars. 
The yard was shaded by stately locusts and elms, 
and a catalpa tree in season rained its pink and white 
blossoms upon the grass. Rows of high box bushes 
lined the fence and walks. It was the Southern style 
and aspect of the place that pleased the eyes of 
the Talbot s. 

In this pleasant, private boarding house they en- 
gaged rooms, including a study for Major Talbot, 
who was adding the finishing chapters to his book, 
"Anecdotes and Reminiscences of the Alabama Army, 
Bench, and Bar." 

Major Talbot was of the old, old South. The pres- 
ent day had little interest or excellence in his eyes. 
His mind lived in that period before the Civil War, 
when the Talbots owned thousands of acres of fine 

133 



134 Sixes and Sevens 

cotton land and the slaves to till them; when the 
family mansion was the scene of princely hospitality, 
and drew its guests from the aristocracy of the South. 
Out of that period he had brought all its old pride and 
scruples of honour, an antiquated and punctilious 
politeness, and (you would think) its wardrobe. 

Such clothes were surely never made within fifty 
years. The major was tall, but whenever he made 
that wonderful, archaic genuflexion he called a bow, 
the corners of his frock coat swept the floor. That 
garment was a surprise even to Washington, which 
has long ago ceased to shy at the frocks and broad- 
brimmed hats of Southern congressmen. One of 
the boarders christened it a "Father Hubbard," 
and it certainly was high in the waist and full in the 
skirt. 

But the major, with all his queer clothes, his immense 
area of plaited, ravelling shirt bosom, and the little 
black string tie with the bow always slipping on one 
side, both was smiled at and liked in Mrs. Vardeman's 
select boarding house. Some of the young depart- 
ment clerks would often "string him," as they called 
it, getting him started upon the subject dearest to 
him the traditions and history of his beloved South- 
land. During his talks he would quote freely from 
the "Anecdotes and Reminiscences." But they 
were very careful not to let him see their designs, for 
in spite of his sixty-eight years, he could make the 



The Duplicity of Har graves 135 

boldest of them uncomfortable under the steady regard 
of his piercing gray eyes. 

Miss Lydia was a plump, little old maid of thirty- 
five, with smoothly drawn, tightly twisted hair that 
made her look still older. Old fashioned, too, she 
was; but ante-bellum glory did not radiate from her 
as it did from the major. She possessed a thrifty 
common sense; and it was she who handled the fi- 
nances of the family, and met all comers when there 
were bills to pay. The major regarded board bills 
and wash bills as contemptible nuisances. They kept 
coming in so persistently and so often. Why, the 
major wanted to know, could they not be filed and paid 
in a lump sum at some convenient period say when 
the "Anecdotes and Reminiscences" had been pub- 
lished and paid for? Miss Lydia would calmly go on 
with her sewing and say, "We'll pay as we go as long 
as the money lasts, and then perhaps they'll have to 
lump it." 

Most of Mrs. Vardeman's boarders were away dur- 
ing the day, being nearly all department clerks and 
business men; but there was one of them who was 
about the house a great deal from morning to night. 
This was a young man named Henry Hopkins Har- 
graves every one in the house addressed him by 
his full name who was engaged at one of the popular 
vaudeville theatres. Vaudeville has risen to such a 
respectable plane in the last few years, and Mr. Har- 



136 Sixes and Sevens 

graves was such a modest and well-mannered person, 
that Mrs. Vardeman could find no objection to en- 
rolling him upon her list of boarders. 

At the theatre Hargraves was known as an all-round 
dialect comedian, having a large repertoire of Ger- 
man, Irish, Swede, and black-face specialties. But 
Mr. Hargraves was ambitious, and often spoke of his 
great desire to succeed in legitimate comedy. 

This young man appeared to conceive a strong fancy 
for Major Talbot. Whenever that gentleman would 
begin his Southern reminiscences, or repeat some of 
the liveliest of the anecdotes, Hargraves could always 
be found, the most attentive among his listeners. 

For a time the major showed an inclination to dis- 
courage the advances of the "play actor," as he pri- 
vately termed him; but soon the young man's agree- 
able manner and indubitable appreciation of the old 
gentleman's stories completely won him over. 

It was not long before the two were like old chums. 
The major set apart each afternoon to read to him the 
manuscript of his book. During the anecdotes Har- 
graves never failed to laugh at exactly the right point. 
The major was moved to declare to Miss Lydia one 
day that young Hargraves possessed remarkable 
perception and a gratifying respect for the old regime. 
And when it came to talking of those old days if 
Major Talbot liked to talk, Mr. Hargraves was en- 
tranced to listen. 



The Duplicity of Har graves 137 

Like almost all old people who talk of the past, the 
major loved to linger over details. In describing the 
splendid, almost royal, days of the old planters, he 
would hesitate until he had recalled the name of the 
Negro who held his horse, or the exact date of certain 
minor happenings, or the number of bales of cotton 
raised in such a year; but Hargraves never grew 
impatient or lost interest. On the contrary, he would 
advance questions on a variety of subjects connected 
with the life of that time, and he never failed to 
extract ready replies. 

The fox hunts, the 'possum suppers, the hoe downs 
and jubilees in the Negro quarters, the banquets in 
the plantation-house hall, when invitations went for 
fifty miles around; the occasional feuds with the neigh- 
bouring gentry; the major's duel with Rathbone 
Culbertson about Kitty Chalmers, who afterward 
married a Thwaite of South Carolina; and private 
yacht races for fabulous sums on Mobile Bay; the 
quaint beliefs, improvident habits, and loyal virtues of 
the old slaves all these were subjects that held both 
the major and Hargraves absorbed for hours at a time. 

Sometimes, at night, when the young man would be 
coming upstairs to his room after his turn at the 
theatre was over, the major would appear at the door 
of his study and beckon archly to him. Going in, 
Hargraves would find a little table set with a decanter, 
sugar bowl, fruit, and a big bunch of fresh green mint. 



138 Sixes and Sevens 

" It occurred to me," the major would begin he 
was always ceremonious "that perhaps you might 
have found your duties at the at your place of occu- 
pation sufficiently arduous to enable you, Mr. 
Hargraves, to appreciate what the poet might well 
have had in his mind when he wrote, 'tired Nature's 
sweet restorer,' one of our Southern juleps." 

It was a fascination to Hargraves to watch him make 
it. He took rank among artists when he began, and 
he never varied the process. With what delicacy he 
bruised the mint; with what exquisite nicety he es- 
timated the ingredients; with what solicitous care he 
capped the compound with the scarlet fruit glowing 
against the dark green fringe! And then the hospital- 
ity and grace with which he offered it, after the selected 
oat straws had been plunged into its tinkling depths! 

After about four months in Washington, Miss 
Lydia discovered one morning that they were almost 
without money. The "Anecdotes and Reminiscences" 
was completed, but publishers had not jumped at the 
collected gems of Alabama sense and wit. The rental 
of a small house which they still owned in Mobile was 
two months in arrears. Their board money for the 
month would be due in three days. Miss Lydia 
called her father to a consultation. 

"No money?" said he with a surprised look. "It 
is quite annoying to be called on so frequently for 
these petty sums. Really, I " 



The Duplicity of Har graves 139 

The major searched his pockets. He found only 
a two-dollar bill, which he returned to his vest 
pocket. 

"I must attend to this at once, Lydia," he said. 
"Kindly get me my umbrella and I will go down town 
immediately. The congressman from our district, 
General Fulghum, assured me some days ago that he 
would use his influence to get my book published at 
an early date. I will go to his hotel at once and see 
what arrangement has been made." 

With a sad little smile Miss Lydia watched him 
button his "Father Hubbard" and depart, pausing at 
the door, as he always did, to bow profoundly. 

That evening, at dark, he returned. It seemed that 
Congressman Fulghum had seen the publisher who had 
the major's manuscript for reading. That person 
had said that if the anecdotes, etc., were carefully 
pruned down about one half, in order to eliminate the 
sectional and class prejudice with which the book 
was dyed from end to end, he might consider its 
publication. 

The major was in a white heat of anger, but regained 
his equanimity, according to his code of manners, as 
soon as he was in Miss Lydia's presence. 

"We must have money," said Miss Lydia, with a 
little wrinkle above her nose. "Give me the two 
dollars, and I will telegraph to Uncle Ralph for some 
to-night." 



140 Sixes and Sevens 

The major drew a small envelope from his upper 
vest pocket and tossed it on the table. 

"Perhaps it was injudicious," he said mildly, "but 
the sum was so merely nominal that I bought tickets 
to the theatre to-night. It's a new war drama, Lydia. 
I thought you would be pleased to witness its first 
production in Washington. I am told that the South 
has very fair treatment in the play. I confess I should 
like to see the performance myself." 

Miss Lydia threw up her hands in silent despair. 

Still, as the tickets were bought, they might as well 
be used. So that evening, as they sat in the theatre 
listening to the lively overture, even Miss Lydia was 
minded to relegate their troubles, for the hour, to 
second place. The major, in spotless linen, with his 
extraordinary coat showing only where it was closely 
buttoned, and his white hair smoothly reached, looked 
really fine and distinguished. The curtain went up 
on the first act of "A Magnolia Flower," revealing a 
typical Southern plantation scene. Major Talbot 
betrayed some interest. 

"Oh, see!" exclaimed Miss Lydia, nudging his* 
arm, and pointing to her programme. 

The major put on his glasses and read the line in 
the cast of characters that her finger indicated. 

Col. Webster Calhoun. . . . H. Hopkins 
Hargraves. 

"It's our Mr. Hargraves," said Miss Lydia. "It 



The Duplicity of Har graves 141 

must be his first appearance in what he calls 'the le- 
gitimate.' I'm so glad for him." 

Not until the second act did Col. Webster Cal- 
houn appear upon the stage. When he made his 
entry Major Talbot gave an audible sniff, glared at 
him, and seemed to freeze solid. Miss Lydia uttered 
a little, ambiguous squeak and crumpled her pro- 
gramme in her hand. For Colonel Calhoun was made 
up as nearly resembling Major Talbot as one pea does 
another. The long, thin white hair, curly at the 
ends, the aristocratic beak of a nose, the crumpled, 
wide, ravelling shirt front, the string tie, with the bow 
nearly under one ear, were almost exactly duplicated. 
And then, to clinch the imitation, he wore the twin 
to the major's supposed to be unparalleled coat. 
High-collared, baggy, empire- waisted, ample-skirted, 
hanging a foot lower in front than behind, the garment 
could have been designed from no other pattern. 
From then on, the major and Miss Lydia sat 
bewitched, and saw the counterfeit presentment 
of a haughty Talbot "dragged," as the major 
afterward expressed it, "through the slanderous mire 
of a corrupt stage." 

Mr. Hargraves had used his opportunities well. 
He had caught the major's little idiosyncrasies of 
speech, accent, and intonation and his pompous court- 
liness to perfection exaggerating all to the purposes 
of the stage. When he performed that marvellous 



142 Sixes and Sevens 

bow that the major fondly imagined to be the pink 
of all salutations, the audience sent forth a sudden 
round of hearty applause. 

Miss Lydia sat immovable, not daring to glance 
toward her father. Sometimes her hand next to him 
would be laid against her cheek, as if to conceal the 
smile which, hi spite of her disapproval, she could not 
entirely suppress. 

The culmination of Hargraves's audacious imitation 
took place in the third act. The scene is where Colo- 
nel Calhoun entertains a few of the neighbouring 
planters in his "den." 

Standing at a table in the centre of the stage, with 
his friends grouped about him, he delivers that inimi- 
table, rambling, character monologue so famous in 
"A Magnolia Flower," at the same time 'that he 
deftly makes juleps for the party. 

Major Talbot, sitting quietly, but white with in- 
dignation, heard his best stories retold, his pet theories 
and hobbies advanced and expanded, and the dream 
of the "Anecdotes and Reminiscences" served, ex- 
aggerated and garbled. His favourite narrative 
that of his duel with Rathbone Culbertson was not 
omitted, and it was delivered with more fire, egotism, 
and gusto than the major himself put into it. 

The monologue concluded with a quaint, delicious, 
witty little lecture on the art of concocting a julep, 
illustrated by the ac"t. Here Major Talbot's delicate 



The Duplicity of Hargraves 148 

but showy science was reproduced to a hair's breadth 

from his dainty handling of the fragrant weed 
"the one- thousandth part of a grain too much pres- 
sure, gentlemen, and you extract the bitterness, in- 
stead of the aroma, of this heaven-bestowed plant " 

to his solicitous selection of the oaten straws. 

At the close of the scene the audience raised a tu- 
multuous roar of appreciation. The portrayal of the 
type was so exact, so sure and thorough, that the 
leading characters in the play were forgotten. After 
repeated calls, Hargraves came before the curtain and 
bowed, his rather boyish face bright and flushed with 
the knowledge of success. 

At last Miss Lydia turned and looked at the major. 
His thin nostrils were working like the gills of a fish. 
He laid both shaking hands upon the arms of his chair 
to rise. 

"We will go, Lydia," he said chokingly. "This 
is an abominable desecration." 

Before he could rise, she pulled him back into his seat. 

"We will stay it out," she declared. "Do you want 
to advertise the copy by exhibiting the original coat?" 
So they remained to the end. 

Hargraves's success must have kept him up late 
that night, for neither at the breakfast nor at the 
dinner table did he appear. 

About three in the afternoon he tapped at the door 
si Major Talbot's study. The major opened it, and 



144 Sixes and Sevens 

Hargraves walked in with his hands f ull of the morning 
papers too full of his triumph to notice anything 
unusual in the major's demeanour. 

"I put it all over 'em last night, major," he began 
exultantly. "I had my inning, and, I think, scored. 
Here's what the Post says: 

His conception and portrayal of the old-time South- 
ern colonel, with his absurd grandiloquence, his 
eccentric garb, his quaint idioms and phrases, his 
moth-eaten pride of family, and his really kind heart, 
fastidious sense of honour, and lovable simplicity, is 
the best delineation of a character role on the boards 
to-day. The coat worn by Colonel Calhoun is itself 
nothing less than an evolution of genius. Mr. Har- 
graves has captured his public. 

"How does that sound, major, for a first nighter? " 

"I had the honour"- the major's voice sounded 
ominously frigid "of witnessing your very remark- 
able performance, sir, last night." 

Hargraves looked disconcerted. 

"You were there? I didn't know you ever I 
didn't know you cared for the theatre. Oh, I say, 
Major Talbot," he exclaimed frankly, "don't you be 
offended. I admit I did get a lot of pointers from you 
that helped me out wonderfully in the part. But 
it's a type, you .know not individual. The way the 
audience caught on shows that. Half the patrons of 
that theatre are Southerners. They recognized it." 



The Duplicity of Har graves 145 

"Mr. Hargraves," said the major, who had remained 
standing, "y u have put upon me an unpardonable 
insult. You have burlesqued my person, grossly 
betrayed my confidence, and misused my hospitality. 
If I thought you possessed the faintest conception of 
what is the sign manual of a gentleman, or what is 
due one, I would call you out, sir, old as I am. I will 
ask you to leave the room, sir." 

The actor appeared to be slightly bewildered, and 
seemed hardly to take in the full meaning of the old 
gentleman's words. 

"I am truly sorry you took offence," he said regret- 
fully. "Up here we don't look at things just as you 
people do. I know men who would buy out half the 
house to have their personality put on the stage so the 
public would recognize it." 

"They are not from Alabama, sir," said the major 
haughtily. 

"Perhaps not. I have a pretty good memory, 
major; let me quote a few lines from your book. In 
response to a toast at a banquet given in Milledge- 
ville, I believe you uttered, and intend to have 
printed, these words: 

The Northern man is utterly without sentiment or 
warmth except in so far as the feelings may be turned 
to his own commercial profit. He will suffer without 
resentment any imputation cast upon the honour of 
himself or his loved ones that does not bear with it 



146 Sixes and Sevens 

the consequence of pecuniary loss. In his charity, 
he gives with a liberal hand; but it must be heralded 
with the trumpet and chronicled in brass. 

"Do you think that picture is fairer than the one you 
saw of Colonel Calhoun last night?" 

"The description," said the major frowning, "is 

not without grounds. Some exag latitude must 
be allowed in public speaking." 

"And in public acting," replied Hargraves. 

"That is not the point," persisted the major, un- 
relenting. "It was a personal caricature. I posi- 
tively decline to overlook it, sir." 

"Major Talbot," said Hargraves, with a winning 
smile, " I wish you would understand me. I want you 
to know that I never dreamed of insulting you. In my 
profession, all life belongs to me. I take what I want, 
and what I can, and return it over the footlights. 
Now, if you will, let's let it go at that. I came in to 
see you about something else. We've been pretty 
good friends for some months, and I'm going to take 
the risk of offending you again. I know you are hard 
up for money never mind how I found out; a board- 
ing house is no place to keep such matters secret 
and I want you to let me help you out of the pinch. 
I've been there often enough myself. I've been 
getting a fair salary all the season, and I've saved 
some money. You're welcome to a couple hundred 

or even more until you get 



The Duplicity of Hargraves 147 

"Stop!" commanded the major, with his arm out- 
stretched. "It seems that my book didn't lie, after 
all. You think your money salve will heal all the hurts 
of honour. Under no circumstances would I accept 
a loan from a casual acquaintance; and as to you, sir, 
I would starve before I would consider your insulting 
offer of a financial adjustment of the circumstances 
we have discussed. I beg to repeat my request rela- 
tive to your quitting the apartment." 

Hargraves took his departure without another word. 
He also left the house the same day, moving, as Mrs. 
Vardeman explained at the supper table, nearer the 
vicinity of the down-town theatre, where "A Magno- 
lia Flower" was booked for a week's run. 

Critical was the situation with Major Talbot and 
Miss Lydia. There was no one in Washington to 
whom the major's scruples allowed him to apply for a 
loan. Miss Lydia wrote a letter to Uncle Ralph, but 
it was doubtful whether that relative's constricted 
affairs would permit him to furnish help. The major 
was forced to make an apologetic address to Mrs. 
Vardeman regarding the delayed payment for board, 
referring to "delinquent rentals" and "delayed re- 
mittances" in a rather confused strain. 

Deliverance came from an entirely unexpected source. 

Late one afternoon the door maid came up and 
announced an old coloured man who wanted to see 
Major Talbot. The major asked that he be sent up 



J48 Sixes and Stvzns 

to his study. Soon an old darkey appeared in the 
doorway, with his hat in hand, bowing, and scraping 
with one clumsy foot. He was quite decently dressed 
in a baggy suit of black. His big, coarse shoes shone 
with a metallic lustre suggestive of stove polish. 
His bushy wool was gray almost white. After 
middle life, it is difficult to estimate the age of a Negro. 
This one might have seen as many years as had Major 
Talbot. 

"I be bound you don't know me, Mars' Pendleton," 
were his first words. 

The major rose and came forward at the old, famil- 
iar style of address. It was one of the old plantation 
darkeys without a doubt; but. they had been widely 
scattered, and he could not recall the voice or face. 

"I don't believe I do," he said kindly "unless you 
will assist my memory." 

"Don't you 'member Cindy's Mose, Mars' Pendle- 
ton, what 'migrated 'mediately after de war?" 

"Wait a moment," said the major, rubbing his 
forehead with the tips of his fingers. He loved to recall 
everything connected with those beloved days. "Cin- 
dy's Mose," he reflected. "You worked among the 
horses breaking the colts. Yes, I remember now. 
After the surrender, you took the name of don't 
prompt me Mitchell, and went to the West to 
Nebraska." 

"Yassir, yassir," the old man's face stretched 



The Duplicity of Hargraves 149 

with a delighted grin "dat's him, dat's it. New- 
braska. Dat's me Mose Mitchell. Old Uncle 
Mose Mitchell, dey calls me now. Old mars', your 
pa, gimme a pah of dem mule colts when I lef ' fur to 
staht me goin' with. You 'member dem colts, Mars' 
Pendleton?" 

"I don't seem to recall the colts," said the major. 
"You know I was married the first year of the war and 
living at the old Follinsbee place. But sit down, sit 
down, Uncle Mose. I'm glad to see you. I hope you 
have prospered." 

Uncle Mose took a chair and laid his hat carefully 
on the floor beside it. 

"Yassir; of late I done mouty famous. When I 
first got to Newbraska, dey folks come all roun' me to 
see dem mule colts. Dey ain't see no mules like dem 
in Newbraska. I sold dem mules for three hundred 
dollars. Yassir three hundred. 

"Den I open a blacksmith shop, suh, and made some 
money and bought some Ian'. Me and my old 'oman 
done raised up seb'm chillun, and all doin' well 'cept 
two of 'em what died. Fo' year ago a railroad come 
along and staht a town slam ag'inst my Ian', and, suh, 
Mars' Pendleton, Uncle Mose am worth leb'm thousand 
dollars in money, property, and Ian'." 

"I'm glad to hear it," said the major heartily. 
"Glad to hear it." 

"And dat little baby of yo'n, Mars' Pendleton 



150 Sixes and Sevens 

one what you name Miss Lyddy I be bound dat 
little tad done growed up tell nobody wouldn't 
know her." 

The major stepped to the door and called: "Lydia, 
dear, will you come?" 

Miss Lydia, looking quite grown up and a little 
worried, came in from her room. 

"Dar, now! What'd I tell you? I knowed dat 
baby done be plum growed up. You don't 'member 
Uncle Mose, child?" 

"This is Aunt Cindy's Mose, Lydia," explained the 
major. "He left Sunnymead for the West when you 
were two years old." 

"Well," said Miss Lydia, "I can hardly be expected 
to remember you, Uncle Mose, at that age. And, as 
you say, I'm 'plum growed up,' and was a blessed long 
time ago. But I'm glad to see you, even if I can't 
remember you." 

And she was. And so was the major. Something 
alive and tangible had come to link them with the 
happy past. The three sat and talked over the olden 
times, the major and Uncle Mose correcting or prompt- 
ing each other as they reviewed the plantation scenes 
and days. 

The major inquired what the old man was doing 
so far from his home. 

"Uncle Mose am a delicate," he explained, "to de 
grand Baptis' convention in dis city. I never preached 



The Duplicity of Har graves 151 

none, but bein' a residin' elder in de church, and able 
fur to pay my own expenses, dey sent me along." 

"And how did you know we were in Washington?" 
inquired Miss Lydia. 

"Dey's a cullud man works in de hotel whar I stops, 
what comes from Mobile. He told me he seen Mars' 
Pendleton comin' outen dish here house one mawnin'. 

"What I come fur," continued Uncle Mose, reaching 
into his pocket "besides de sight of home folks 
was to pay Mars' Pendleton what I owes him." 

"Owe me?" said the major, in surprise. 

"Yassir three hundred dollars." He handed 
the major a roll of bills. "When I lef old mars' says: 
'Take dem mule colts, Mose, and, if it be so you gits 
able, pay fur 'em'. Yassir dem was his words. 
De war had done lef old mars' po' hisself . Old mars' 
bein' 'long ago dead, de debt descends to Mars' Pen- 
dleton. Three hundred dollars. Uncle Mose is plenty 
able to pay now. When dat railroad buy my Ian' I 
laid off to pay fur dem mules. Count de money, Mars' 
Pendleton. Dat's what I sold dem mules fur. Yassir." 

Tears were in Major Talbot's eyes. He took Uncle 
Mose's hand and laid his other upon his shoulder. 

"Dear, faithful, old servitor," he said in an unsteady 
voice, "I don't mind saying to you that 'Mars' Pen- 
dleton' spent his last dollar in the world a week ago. 
We will accept this money, Uncle Mose, since, in a way, 
it is a sort of payment, as well as a token of the loyalty 



Sixes and Sevens 

and devotion of the old regime. Lydia, my dear, take 
the money. You are better fitted than I to manage 
its expenditure." 

"Take it, honey," said Uncle Mose. "Hit belongs 
to you. Hit's Talbot money." 

After Uncle Mose had gone, Miss Lydia had a good 
cry for joy; and the major turned his face to a 
corner, and smoked his clay pipe volcanically. 

The succeeding days saw the Talbots restored to 
peace and ease. Miss Lydia's face lost its worried 
look. The major appeared in a new frock coat, in 
which he looked like a wax figure personifying the 
memory of his golden age. Another publisher who 
read the manuscript of the "Anecdotes and Reminis- 
cences" thought that, with a little retouching and 
toning down of the high lights, he could make a really 
bright and salable volume of it. Altogether, the situ- 
ation was comfortable, and not without the touch 
of hope that is often sweeter than arrived blessings. 

One day, about a week after their piece of good luck, 
a maid brought a letter for Miss Lydia to her room. 
The postmark showed that it was from New York. 
Not knowing any one there, Miss Lydia, in a mild 
flutter of wonder, sat down by her table and opened 
the letter with her scissors. This was what she read: 

DEAR Miss TALBOT: 

I thought you might be glad to learn of my good 
fortune. I have received and accepted an offer of 



The Duplicity of Har graves 153 

two hundred dollars per week by a New York stock 
company to play Colonel Calhoun in "A Magnolia 
Flower." 

There is something else I wanted you to know. I 
guess you'd better not tell Major Talbot. I was 
anxious to make him some amends for the great help 
he was to me in studying the part, and for the bad 
humour he was in about it. He refused to let me, so 
I did it anyhow. I could easily spare the three 
hundred. 

Sincerely yours, 

H. HOPKINS HARGRAVES. 
P. S. How did I play Uncle Mose? 

Major Talbot, passing through the hall, saw Miss 
Lydia's door open and stopped. 

"Any mail for us this morning, Lydia, dear?" he 
asked. 

Miss Lydia slid the letter beneath a fold of her dress. 

"The Mobile Chronicle came," she said promptly. 
"It's on the table in your study." 



XIV 

LET ME FEEL YOUR PULSE 

oO I went to a doctor. 

"How long has it been since you took any alcohol 
into your system?" he asked. 

Turning my head sidewise, I answered, "Oh, quite 
awhile." 

He was a young doctor, somewhere between twenty 
and forty. He wore heliotrope socks, but he looked 
like Napoleon. I liked him immensely. 

"Now," said he, "I am going to show you the effect 
of alcohol upon your circulation." I think it was 
"circulation" he said; though it may have been 
"advertising." 

He bared my left arm to the elbow, brought out a 
bottle of whiskey, and gave me a drink. He began to 
look more like Napoleon. I began to like him 
better. 

Then he put a tight compress on my upper arm, 
stopped my pulse with his fingers, and squeezed a 
rubber bulb connected with an apparatus on a stand 
that looked like a thermometer. The mercury 
jumped up and down without seeming to stop any- 

154 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 155 

where; but the doctor said it registered two hundred 
and thirty-seven or one hundred and sixty-five or 
some such number. 

"Now," said he, "you see what alcohol does to 
the blood-pressure." 

"It's marvellous," said I, "but do you think it a 
sufficient test? Have one on me, and let's try the 
other arm." But, no! 

Then he grasped my hand. I thought I was doomed 
and he was saying good-bye. But all he wanted to 
do was to jab a needle into the end of a finger and com- 
pare the red drop with a lot of fifty-cent poker chips 
that he had fastened to a card. 

"It's the haemoglobin test," he explained. "The 
colour of your blood is wrong." 

"Well," said I, "I know it should be blue; but 
this is a country of mix-ups. Some of my ancestors 
were cavaliers; but they got thick with some people 
on Nantucket Island, so ' 

"I mean," said the doctor, "that the shade of red 
is too light." 

"Oh," said I, "it's a case of matching instead of 
matches." 

The doctor then pounded me severely in the region 
of the chest. When he did that I don't know whether 
he reminded me most of Napoleon or Battling or Lord 
Nelson. Then he looked grave and mentioned a 
string of grievances that the flesh is heir to mostly 



156 Sixes and Sevens 

ending in "itis." I immediately paid him fifteen 
dollars on account. 

"Is or are it or some or any of them necessarily 
fatal?" I asked. I thought my connection with the 
matter justified my manifesting a certain amount 
of interest. 

"All of them," he answered cheerfully. "But 
their progress may be arrested. With care and proper 
continuous treatment you may live to be eighty-five 
or ninety." 

I began to think of the doctor's bill. "Eighty- 
five would be sufficient, I am sure," was my comment. 
I paid him ten dollars more on account. 

"The first thing to do," he said, with renewed 
animation, "is to find a sanitarium where you will 
get a complete rest for a while, and allow your nerves 
to get into a better condition. I myself will go with 
you and select a suitable one." 

So he took me to a mad-house in the Catskills. It 
was on a bare mountain frequented only by infrequent 
frequenters. You could see nothing but stones and 
boulders, some patches of snow, and scattered pine 
trees. The young physician in charge was most 
agreeable. He gave me a stimulant without applying 
a compress to the arm. It was luncheon time, and 
we were invited to partake. There were about 
twenty inmates at little tables in the dining room. 
The young physician in charge came to our table 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 157 

And said: "It is a custom with our guests not to 
regard themselves as patients, but merely as tired 
ladies and gentlemen taking a rest. Whatever 
slight maladies they may have are never alluded to 
in conversation. ' ' 

My doctor called loudly to a waitress to bring some 
phosphogly cerate of lime hash, dog-bread, bromo- 
seltzer pancakes, and mix vomica tea for my repast. 
Then a sound arose like a sudden wind storm among 
pine trees. It was produced by every guest in the 
room whispering loudly, "Neurasthenia!" except 
one man with a nose, whom I distinctly heard say, 
"Chronic alcoholism." I hope to meet him again. 
The physician in charge turned and walked away. 

An hour or so after luncheon he conducted us to 
the workshop say fifty yards from the house. 
Thither the guests had been conducted by the physi- 
cian in charge's understudy and sponge-holder a 
man with feet and a blue sweater. He was so tall 
that I was not sure he had a face; but the Armour 
Packing Company would have been delighted with 
his hands. 

"Here," said the physician in charge, "our guests 
find relaxation from past mental worries by devoting 
themselves to physical labour recreation, in reality." 

There were turning-lathes, carpenters' outfits, clay- 
modelling tools, spinning-wheels, weaving-frames, 
treadmills, bass drums, enlarged-crayon-portrait ap- 



158 Sixes and Sevens 

paratuses, blacksmith forges, and everything, seem- 
ingly, that could interest the paying lunatic 
guests of a first-rate sanitarium. 

"The lady making mud pies in the corner," whis- 
pered the physician in charge," is no other than Lula 
Lulington, the authoress of the novel entitled 'Why 
Love Loves.' What she is doing now is simply 
to rest her mind after performing that piece of 
work." 

I had seen the book. "Why doesn't she do it 
by writing another one instead?" I asked. 

As you see, I wasn't as far gone as they thought 
I was. 

"The gentleman pouring water through the funnel," 
continued the physician in charge, "is a Wall Street 
broker broken down from overwork." 

I buttoned my coat. 

Others he pointed out were architects playing with 
Noah's arks, ministers reading Darwin's "Theory of 
Evolution," lawyers sawing wood, tired-out society 
ladies talking Ibsen to the blue-sweatered sponge- 
holder, a neurotic millionaire lying asleep on the 
floor, and a prominent artist drawing a little red wagon 
around the room. 

"You look pretty strong," said the physician in 
charge to me. "I think the best mental relaxation 
for you would be throwing small boulders over the 
mountainside and then bringing them up again." 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 159 

I was a hundred yards away before my doctor 
overtook me. 

"What's the matter?" he asked. 

"The matter is," said I, "that there are no aero- 
planes handy. So I am going to merrily and hastily 
jog the foot-pathway to yon station and catch the 
first unlimited-soft-coal express back to town." 

"Well," said the doctor, "perhaps you are right. 
This seems hardly the suitable place for you. 
But what you need is rest absolute rest and 
exercise." 

That night I went to a hotel in the city, and said 
to the clerk: "What I need is absolute rest and 
exercise. Can you give me a room with one of those 
tall folding beds in it, and a relay of bellboys to 
work it up and down while I rest?" 

The clerk rubbed a speck off one of his finger nails 
and glanced sidewise at a tall man in a white hat 
sitting in the lobby. That man came over and asked 
me politely if I had seen the shrubbery at the west 
entrance. I had not, so he showed it to me and then 
looked me over. 

"I thought you had 'em," he said, not unkindly, 
"but I guess you're all right. You'd better go see a 
doctor, old man." 

A week afterward my doctor tested my blood 
pressure again without the preliminary stimulant. 
He looked to me a little less like Napoleon. And his 



160 Sixes and Sevens 

socks were of a shade of tan that did not appeal 
to me. 

"What you need," he decided, "is sea air and 
companionship. ' ' 

"Would a mermaid ' I began; but he slipped 
on his professional manner. 

"I myself," he said, "will take you to the Hotel 
Bonair off the coast of Long Island and see that you 
get in good shape. It is a quiet, comfortable resort 
where you will soon recuperate." 

The Hotel Bonair proved to be a nine-hundred- 
room fashionable hostelry on an island off the main 
shore. Everybody who did not dress for dinner was 
shoved into a side dining-room and given only a terrapin 
and champagne table d'hote. The bay was a great 
stamping ground for wealthy yachtsmen. The Corsair 
anchored there the day we arrived. I saw Mr. Mor- 
gan standing on deck eating a cheese sandwich and 
gazing longingly at the hotel. Still, it was a very inex- 
pensive place. Nobody could afford to pay their prices. 
Wlien you went away you simply left your baggage, 
stole a skiff, and beat it for the mainland in the night. 

When I had been there one day I got a pad of 
monogrammed telegraph blanks at the clerk's desk 
and began to wire to all my friends for get-away money. 
My doctor and I played one game of croquet on the 
golf links and went to sleep on the lawn. 

When we got back to town a thought seemed to 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 161 

occur to him suddenly. "By the way," he asked, 
"how do you feel?" 

"Relieved of very much," I replied. 

Now a consulting physician is different. He 
isn't exactly sure whether he is to be paid or not, 
and this uncertainty insures you either the most 
careful or the most careless attention. My doctor 
took me to see a consulting physician. He made a 
poor guess and gave me careful attention. I liked 
him immensely. He put me through some coordina- 
tion exercises. 

"Have you a pain in the back of your head?" he 
asked. I told him I had not. 

"Shut your eyes," he ordered, "put your feet close 
together, and jump backward as far as you can;" 

I always was a good backward jumper with my 
eyes shut, so I obeyed. My head struck the edge of 
the bathroom door, which had been left open and was 
only three feet away. The doctor was very sorry. 
He had overlooked the fact that the door was open. 
He closed it. 

"Now touch your nose with your right forefinger," 
he said. 

"Where is it?" I asked. 

"On your face," said he. 

"I mean my right forefinger," I explained. 

"Oh, excuse me," said he. He reopened the bath- 
room door, and I took my finger out of the crack of it. 



162 Sixes and Sevens 

After I had performed the marvellous digito-nasal 
feat I said: 

"I do not wish to deceive you as to symptoms, 
Doctor; I really have something like a pain in the 
back of my head." He ignored the symptom and 
examined my heart carefully with a latest-popular- 
air-penny-in-the-slot ear- trumpet. I felt like a ballad. 

"Now," he said, "gallop like a horse for about 
five minutes around the room." 

I gave the best imitation I could of a disqualified 
Percheron being led out of Madison Square Garden. 
Then, without dropping in a penny, he listened to 
my chest again. 

"No glanders in our family, Doc," I said. 

The consulting physician held up his forefinger 
within three inches of my nose. "Look at my finger," 
he commanded. 

"Did you ever try Pears' - 'I began; but he 
went on with his test rapidly. 

"Now look across the bay. At my finger. Across 
the bay. At my finger. At my finger. Across the 
bay. Across the bay. At my finger. Across the 
bay." This for about three minutes. 

He explained that this was a test of the action of 
the brain. It seemed easy to me. I never once 
mistook his finger for the bay. I'll bet that if he had 
used the phrases: "Gaze, as it were, unpreoccupied, 
outward or rather laterally in the direction of 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 163 

the horizon, underlaid, so to speak, with the adjacent 
fluid inlet," and "Now, returning or rather, in a 
manner, withdrawing your attention, bestow it upon 
my upraised digit" I'll bet, I say, that Henry 
James himself could have passed the examination. 

After asking me if I had ever had a grand uncle 
with curvature of the spine or a cousin with swelled 
ankles, the two doctors retired to the bathroom and 
sat on the edge of the bath tub for their consultation. 
I ate an apple, and gazed first at my finger and then 
across the bay. 

The doctors came out looking grave. More: they 
looked tombstones and Tennessee-papers-please-copy. 
They wrote out a diet list to which I was to be re- 
stricted. It had everything that I had ever heard 
of to eat on it, except snails. And I never eat a snail 
unless it overtakes me and bites me first. 

"You must follow this diet strictly," said the 
doctors. 

" I'd follow it a mile if I could get one-tenth of what'a 
on it," I answered. 

"Of next importance," they went on, "is outdoor 
air and exercise. And here is a prescription that 
will be of great benefit to you." 

Then all of us took something. They took their 
hats, and I took my departure. 

I went to a druggist and showed him the prescrip- 
tion. 



164 Sixes and Sevens 

"It will be $2.87 for an ounce bottle," he said. 

"Will you give me a piece of your wrapping cord?" 
said I. 

I made a hole in the prescription, ran the cord 
through it, tied it around my neck, and tucked it 
inside. All of us have a little superstition, and mine 
runs to a confidence in amulets. 

Of course there was nothing the matter with me, 
but I was very ill. I couldn't work, sleep, eat, or 
bowl. The only way I could get any sympathy was 
to go without shaving for four days. Even then 
somebody would say: "Old man, you look as hardy 
as a pine knot. Been up for a jaunt in the Maine 
woods, eh?" 

Then, suddenly, I remembered that I must have 
outdoor air and exercise. So I went down South to 
John's. John is an approximate relative by verdict 
of a preacher standing with a little book in his hands 
in a bower of chrysanthemums while a hundred 
thousand people looked on. John has a country 
house seven miles from Pineville. It is at an altitude 
and on the Blue Ridge Mountains in a state too 
dignified to be dragged into this controversy. John 
is mica, which is more valuable and clearer than 
gold. 

He met me at Pineville, and we took the trolley car 
to his home. It is a big, neighbourless cottage on a 
hill surrounded by a hundred mountains. We got 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 1 >o 

off at his little private station, where John's family 
and Amaryllis met and greeted us. Amaryllis looked 
at me a trifle anxiously. 

A rabbit came bounding across the hill between 
us and the house. I threw down my suit-case and 
pursued it hotfoot. After I had run twenty yards 
and seen it disappear, I sat down on the grass and 
wept disconsolately. 

"I can't catch a rabbit any more," I sobbed. "I'm 
of no further use in the world. I may as well be dead." 

"Oh, what is it what is it, Brother John?" I 
heard Amaryllis say. 

"Nerves a little unstrung," said John, in his calm 
way. "Don't worry. Get up, you rabbit-chaser, 
and come on to the house before the biscuits .get cold." 
It was about twilight, and the mountains came up 
nobly to Miss Murfree's descriptions of them. 

Soon after dinner I announced that I believed I 
could sleep for a year or two, including legal holidays. 
So I was shown to a room as big and cool as a flower 
garden, where there was a bed as broad as a lawn. 
Soon afterward the remainder of the household re- 
tired, and then there fell upon the land a silence. 

I had not heard a silence before in years. It was 
absolute. I raised myself on my elbow and listened 
to it. Sleep! I thought that if I only could hear a 
star twinkle or a blade of grass sharpen itself I could 
compose myself to rest. I thought once that I heard 



166 Sixes and Sevens 

a sound like the sail of a catboat flapping as it veered 
about in a breeze, but I decided that it was probably 
only a tack in the carpet. Still I listened. 

Suddenly some belated little bird alighted upon the 
window-sill, and, in what he no doubt considered 
sleepy tones, enunciated the noise generally translated 
as "cheep!" 

I leaped into the air. 

"Hey! what's the matter down there?" called 
John from his room above mine. 

"Oh, nothing," I answered, "except that I acci- 
dentally bumped my head against the ceiling." 

The next morning I went out on the porch and 
looked at the mountains. There were forty-seven 
of them in sight. I shuddered, went into the big 
hall sitting room of the house, selected "Pancoast's 
Family Practice of Medicine" from a bookcase, and 
began to read. John came in, took the book away 
from me, and led me outside. He has a farm of three 
hundred acres furnished with the usual complement 
of barns, mules, peasantry, and harrows with three 
front teeth broken off. I had seen such things in my 
childhood, and my heart began to sink. 

Then John spoke of alfalfa, and I brightened at 
once. "Oh, yes," said I, "wasn't she in the chorus 
of let's see " 

" Green, you know," said John, " and tender, and you 
plow it under after the first season." 



Lei Me Feel Your Pulse 167 

**I know," said I, "and the grass grows over her." 

"Right," said John. "You know something about 
farming, after all." 

"I know something of some farmers," said I, "and 
a sure scythe will mow them down some day." 

On the way back to the house a beautiful and inex- 
plicable creature walked across our path. I stopped 
irresistibly fascinated, gazing at it. John waited 
patiently, smoking his cigarette. He is a modern 
farmer. After ten minutes he said: "Are you going 
to stand there looking at that chicken all day? Break- 
fast is nearly ready." 

"A chicken?" said I. 

"A White Orpington hen, if you want to particu- 
larize." 

"A White Orpington hen?" I repeated, with intense 
interest. The fowl walked slowly away with graceful 
dignity, and I followed like a child after the Pied 
Piper. Five minutes more were allowed me by John, 
and then he took me by the sleeve and conducted 
me to breakfast. 

After I had been there a week I began to grow 
alarmed. I was sleeping and eating well and actually 
beginning to enjoy life. For a man in my desperate 
condition that would never do. So I sneaked down 
to the trolley-car station, took the car for Pineville, 
and went to see one of the best physicians in town. 
By this time I knew exactly what to do when I needed 



168 Sixes and Sevens 

medical treatment. I hung my hat on the back of a 
chair, and said rapidly: 

"Doctor, I have cirrhosis of the heart, indurated 
arteries, neurasthenia, neuritis, acute indigestion, and 
convalescence. I am going to live on a strict diet. 
I shall also take a tepid bath at night and a cold one 
in the morning. I shall endeavour to be cheerful, 
and fix my mind on pleasant subjects. In the way 
of drugs I intend to take a phosphorous pill three 
times a day, preferably after meals, and a tonic com- 
posed of the tinctures of gentian, cinchona, calisaya, 
and cardamom compound. Into each teaspoonful 
of this I shall mix tincture of nux vomica, beginning 
with one drop and increasing it a drop each day until 
the maximum dose is reached. I shall drop this with 
a medicine-dropper, which can be procured at a trifling 
cost at any pharmacy. Good morning." 

I took my hat and walked out. After I had closed 
the door I remembered something that I had forgotten 
to say. I opened it again. The doctor had not moved 
from where he had been sitting, but he gave a slightly 
nervous start when he saw me again. 

"I forgot to mention," said I, "that I shall also 
take absolute rest and exercise." 

After this consultation I felt much better. The 
reestablishing in my mind of the fact that I was hope- 
lessly ill gave me so much satisfaction that I almost 
became gloomy again. There is nothing more alarm- 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 169 

ing to a neurasthenic than to feel himself growing well 
and cheerful. 

John looked after me carefully. After I had evinced 
so much interest in his White Orpington chicken he 
tried his best to divert my mind, and was particular 
to lock his hen house of nights. Gradually the tonic 
mountain air, the wholesome food, and the daily 
walks among the hills so alleviated my malady that 
I became utterly wretched and despondent. I heard 
of a country doctor who lived in the mountains near- 
by. I went to see him and told him the whole story. 
He was a gray-bearded man with clear, blue, wrinkled 
eyes, in a home-made suit of gray jeans. 

In order to save time I diagnosed my case, touched 
my nose with my right forefinger, struck myself 
below the knee to make my foot kick, sounded my 
chest, stuck out my tongue, and asked him the price 
of cemetery lots in Pineville. 

He lit his pipe and looked at me for about three 
minutes. "Brother," he said, after a while, "you 
are in a mighty bad way. There's a chance for you 
to pull through, but it's a mighty slim one." 

"What can it be? " I asked eagerly. "I have taken 
arsenic and gold, phosphorus, exercise, mix vomica, 
hydrotherapeutic baths, rest, excitement, codein, and 
aromatic spirits of ammonia. Is there anything left 
in the pharmacopeia? " 

"Somewhere in these mountains," said the doctor, 



170 Sixes and Sevens 

"there's a plant growing a flowering plant that'll 
cure you, and it's about the only thing that will. It's 
of a kind that's as old as the world; but of late it's 
powerful scarce and hard to find. You and I will 
have to hunt it up. I'm not engaged in active prac- 
tice now: I'm getting along in years; but I'll take 
your case. You'll have to come every day in the 
afternoon and help me hunt for this plant till we find 
it. The city doctors may know a lot about new scien- 
tific things, but they don't know much about the 
cures that nature carries around in her saddle- 
bags." 

So every day the old doctor and I hunted the cure- 
all plant among the mountains and valleys of the 
Blue Ridge. Together we toiled up steep heights 
so slippery with fallen autumn leaves that we had 
to catch every sapling and branch within our reach 
to save us from falling. We waded through gorges 
and chasms, breast-deep with laurel and ferns; we 
followed the banks of mountain streams for miles; 
we wound our way like Indians through brakes of 
pine road side, hill side, river side, mountain side we 
explored in our search for the miraculous plant. 

As the old doctor said, it must have grown scarce 
and hard to find. But we followed our quest. Day 
by day we plumbed the valleys, scaled the heights, 
and tramped the plateaus in search of the miraculous 
plant. Mountain-bred, he never seemed to tire. I 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 171 

often reached home too fatigued to do anything except 
fall into bed and sleep until morning. This we kept 
up for a month. 

One evening after I had returned from a six-mile 
tramp with the old doctor, Amaryllis and I took a 
little walk under the trees near the road. We looked 
at the mountains drawing their royal-purple robes 
around them for their night's repose. 

"I'm glad you're well again," she said. "When 
you first came you frightened me. I thought you 
were really ill." 

"Well again!" I almost shrieked. "Do you know 
that I have only one chance in a thousand to live?" 

Amaryllis looked at me in surprise. "W T hy," 
said she, "you are as strong as one of the plough- 
mules, you sleep ten or twelve hours every night, 
and you are eating us out of house and home. What 
more do you want?" 

" I tell you," said I, "that unless we find the magic 
that is, the plant we are looking for in time, nothing 
can save me. The doctor tells me so." 

"What doctor?" 

"Doctor Tatum the old doctor who lives half- 
way up Black Oak Mountain. Do you know 
him?" 

"I have known him since I was able to talk. And 
is that where you go every day is it he who takes 
you on these long walks and climbs that have brought 



172 Sixes and Seven* 

back your health and strength? God bless the old 
doctor." 

Just then the old doctor himself drove slowly down 
the road in his rickety old buggy. I waved my hand 
at him and shouted that I would be on hand the next 
day at the usual time. He stopped his horse and 
called to Amaryllis to come out to him. They talked 
for five minutes while I waited. Then the old doctor 
drove on. 

When we got to the house Amaryllis lugged out an 
encyclopaedia and sought a word in it. "The doctor 
said," she told me, "that you needn't call any more 
as a patient, but he'd be glad to see you any time as a 
friend. And then he told me to look up my name 
in the encyclopaedia and tell you what it means. It 
seems to be the name of a genus of flowering plants, 
and also the name of a country girl in Theocritus and 
Virgil. What do you suppose the doctor meant by 
that?" 

"I know what he meant," said I. "I know 
now." 

A word to a brother who may have come under the 
spell of the unquiet Lady Neurasthenia. 

The formula was true. Even though gropingly at 
times, the physicians of the walled cities had put their 
fingers upon the specific medicament. 

And so for the exercise one is referred to good Doctor 
Tatum on Black Oak Mountain take the road to 



Let Me Feel Your Pulse 173 

your right at the Methodist meeting house in the 
pine-grove. 

Absolute rest and exercise! 

What rest more remedial than to sit with Amaryllis 
in the shade, and, with a sixth sense, read the wordless 
Theocritan idyl of the gold-bannered blue mountains 
marching orderly into the dormitories of the night? 



XV 

OCTOBER AND JUNE 

1 HE Captain gazed gloomily at his sword that hung 
upon the wall. In the closet near by was stored his 
faded uniform, stained and worn by weather and 
service. What a long, long time it seemed since those 
old days of war's alarms ! 

And now, veteran that he was of his country's 
strenuous times, he had been reduced to abject sur- 
render by a woman's soft eyes and smiling lips. As 
he sat in his quiet room he held in his hand the letter 
he had just received from her the letter that had 
caused him to wear that look of gloom. He re-read 
the fatal paragraph that had destroyed his hope. 

In declining the honour you have done me in asking 
me to be your wife, I feel that I ought to speak frankly. 
The reason I have for so doing is the great difference 
between our ages. I like you very, very much, but 
I am sure that our marriage would not be a happy 
one. I am sorry to have to refer to this, but I believe 
that you will appreciate my honesty in giving you the 
true reason. 

The Captain sighed, and leaned his head upon his 
174 



October and June 175 

hand. Yes, there were many years between their 
ages. But he was strong and rugged, he had position 
and wealth. Would not his love, his tender care, 
and the advantages he could bestow upon her make 
her forget the question of age? Besides, he was almost 
sure that she cared for him. 

The Captain was a man of prompt action. In the 
field he had been distinguished for his decisiveness 
and energy. He would see her and plead his cause 
again in person. Age ! what was it to come be- 
tween him and the one he loved? 

In two hours he stood ready, hi light marching 
order, for his greatest battle. He took the train 
for the old Southern town in Tennessee where she 
lived. 

Theodora Deming was on the steps of the handsome, 
porticoed old mansion, enjoying the summer twilight^ 
when the Captain entered the gate and came up the 
gravelled walk. She met him with a smile that was 
free from embarrassment. As the Captain stood on 
the step below her, the difference in their ages did not 
appear so great. He was tall and straight and clear- 
eyed and browned. She was in the bloom of lovely 
womanhood. 

"I wasn't expecting you," said Theodora; "but 
now that you've come you may sit on the step. Didn't 
you get my letter? " 

"I did," said the Captain; "and that's why I 



176 Sixes and Sevens 

came. I say, now, Theo, reconsider your answer, 
won't you?" 

Theodora smiled softly upon him. He carried his 
years well. She was really fond of his strength, his 
wholesome looks, his manliness perhaps, if 

"No, no," she said, shaking her head, positively; 
"it's out of the question. I like you a whole lot, but 
marrying won't do. My age and yours are but 
don't make me say it again I told you in my letter." 

The Captain flushed a little through the bronze 
on his face. He was silent for a while, gazing sadly 
into the twilight. Beyond a line of woods that he 
could see was a field where the boys in blue had onee 
bivouacked on their march toward the sea. How 
long ago it seemed now! Truly, Fate and Father 
Time had tricked him sorely. Just a few years in- 
terposed between himself and happiness! 

Theodora's hand crept down and rested in the clasp 
of his firm, brown one. She felt, at least, that senti- 
ment that is akin to love. 

"Don't take it so hard, please," she said, gently. 
"It's all for the best. I've reasoned it out very wisely 
all by myself. Some day you'll be glad I didn't marry 
you. It would be very nice and lovely for a while 
but, just think! In only a few short years what 
different tastes we would have! One of us would 
want to sit by the fireside and read, and maybe nurse 
neuralgia or rheumatism of evenings, while the other 



October and June 177 

would be crazy for balls and theatres and late suppers. 
No, my dear friend. While it isn't exactly January 
and May, it's a clear case of October and pretty early 
in June." 

"I'd always do what you wanted me to do, Theo. 
If you wanted to " 

"No, you wouldn't. You think now that you 
would, but you wouldn't. Please don't ask me any 
more." 

The Captain had lost his battle. But he was a 
gallant warrior, and when he rose to make his final 
adieu his mouth was grimly set and his shoulders were 
squared. 

He took the train for the North that night. On the 
mext evening he was back in his room, where his sword 
was hanging against the wall. He was dressing for 
dinner, tying his white tie into a very careful bow. 
And at the same time he was indulging in a pensive 
soliloquy. 

"'Pon my honour, I believe Theo was right, after 
all. Nobody can deny that she's a peach, but she 
must be twenty-eight, at the very kindest calculation." 

For you see, the Captain was only nineteen, and his 
sword had never been drawn except on the parade 
ground at Chattanooga, which was as near as he ever 
got to the Spanish-American War. 



XVI 
THE CHURCH WITH AN OVERSHOT- WHEEL 

J-/AKELANDS is not to be found in the catalogues of 
fashionable summer resorts. It lies on a low spur 
of the Cumberland range of mountains on a little 
tributary of the Clinch River. Lakelands proper is 
a contented village of two dozen houses situated on a 
forlorn, narrow-gauge railroad line. You wonder 
whether the railroad lost itself in the pine woods 
and ran into Lakelands from fright and loneliness, 
or whether Lakelands got lost and huddled itself 
along the railroad to wait for the cars to carry it 
home. 

You wonder again why it was named Lakelands. 
There are no lakes, and the lands about are too poor 
to be worth mentioning. 

Half a mile from the village stands the Eagle House, 
a big, roomy old mansion run by Josiah Rankin for 
the accommodation of visitors who desire the mountain 
air at inexpensive rates. The Eagle House is delight- 
fully mismanaged. It is full of ancient instead of 
modern improvements, and it is altogether as comforta- 
bly neglected and pleasingly disarranged as your own 

178 



The Church with an Over shot-Wheel 179 

home. But you are furnished with clean rooms and 
good and abundant fare : yourself and the piny woods 
must do the rest. Nature has provided a mineral 
spring, grape-vine swings, and croquet even the 
wickets are wooden. You have Art to thank only for 
the fiddle-and-guitar music twice a week at the hop 
in the rustic pavilion. 

The patrons of the Eagle House are those who 
seek recreation as a necessity, as well as a pleasure. 
They are busy people, who may be likened to clocks 
that need a fortnight's winding to insure a year's 
running of their wheels. You will find students there 
from the lower towns, now and then an artist, or a 
geologist absorbed in construing the ancient strata 
of the hills. A few quiet families spend the summers 
there; and often one or two tired members of that 
patient sisterhood known to Lakelands as "school- 
marms." 

A quarter of a mile from the Eagle House was what 
would have been described to its guests as "an object 
of interest" in the catalogue, had the Eagle House 
issued a catalogue. This was an old, old mill that was 
no longer a mill. In the words of Josiah Rankin, 
it was "the only church in the United States, sah, 
with an overshot- wheel; and the only mill in the world, 
sah, with pews and a pipe organ." The guests of the 
Eagle House attended the old mill church each Sabbath,. 
and heard the preacher liken the purified Christian 



180 Sixes and Sevens 

to bolted flour ground to usefulness between the 
millstones of experience and suffering. 

Every year about the beginning of autumn there 
came to the Eagle House one Abram Strong, who 
remained for a time an honoured and beloved guest. 
In Lakelands he was called "Father Abram," because 
his hair was so white, his face so strong and kind and 
florid, his laugh so merry, and his black clothes and 
broad hat so priestly in appearance. Even new guects 
after three or four days' acquaintance gave him this 
familiar title. 

Father Abram came a long way to Lakelands. He 
lived in a big, roaring town in the Northwest where 
he owned mills, not little mills with pews and an 
organ in them, but great, ugly, mountain-like mills 
that the freight trains crawled around all day like 
ants around an ant-heap. And now you must be 
told about Father Abram and the mill that was a 
church, for their stories run together. 

In the days when the church was a mill, Mr. 
Strong was the miller. There was no jollier, dustier, 
busier, happier miller in all the land than he. He 
lived in a little cottage across the road from the mill. 
His hand was heavy, but his toll was light, and the 
mountaineers brought their grain to him across many 
weary miles of rocky roads. 

The delight of the miller's life was his little daughter, 
Aglaia. That was a brave name, truly, for a flaxen- 



The Church with an Over shot-Wheel 181 

haired toddler; but the mountaineers love sonorous 
and stately names. The mother had encountered 
it somewhere in a book, and the deed was done. In 
her babyhood Aglaia herself repudiated the name, 
as far as common use went, and persisted in calling 
herself "Dums." The miller and his wife often tried 
to coax from Aglaia the source of this mysterious 
name, but without results. At last they arrived at 
a theory. In the little garden behind the cottage was 
a bed of rhododendrons in which the child took a 
peculiar delight and interest. It may have been that 
she perceived in "Dums" a kinship to the formidable 
name of her favourite flowers. 

When Aglaia was four years old she and her father 
used to go through a little performance in the mill 
every afternoon, that never failed to come off, the 
weather permitting. When supper was ready her 
mother would brush her hair and put on a clean apron 
and send her across to the mill to bring her father 
home. When the miller saw her coming in the mill 
door he would come forward, all white with the flour 
dust, and wave his hand and sing an old miller's 
song that was familiar in those parts and ran something 
like this: 

"The wheel goes round, 
The grist is ground, 

The dusty miller's merry. 
He sings all day, 
His work is play, 

While thinking of his dearie." 



182 Sixes and Sevens 

Then Aglaia would run to him laughing, and call: 
"Da-da, come take Dums home;" and the miller 
would swing her to his shoulder and march over to 
supper, singing the miller's song. Every evening 
this would take place. 

One day, only a week after her fourth birthday, 
Aglaia disappeared. When last seen she was plucking 
wild flowers by the side of the road in front of the cot- 
tage. A little while later her mother went out to see that 
she did not stray too far away, and she was already gone. 

Of course every effort was made to find her. The 
neighbours gathered and searched the woods and the 
mountains for miles around. They dragged every 
foot of the mill race and the creek for a long distance 
below the dam. Never a trace of her did they find. 
A night or two before there had been a family of wan- 
derers camped in a grove near by. It was conjectured 
that they might have stolen the child; but when their 
wagon was overtaken and searched she could not be 
found. 

The miller remained at the mill for nearly two 
years; and then his hope of finding her died out. He 
and his wife moved to the Northwest. In a few 
years he was the owner of a modern mill in one of the 
important milling cities in that region. Mrs. Strong 
never recovered from the shock caused by the loss of 
Aglaia, and two years after they moved away the miller 
was left to bear his sorrow alone. 



Tlie Church with an Over shot-Wheel 18C 

When Abram Strong became prosperous he paid a 
visit to Lakelands and the old mill. The scene was a 
sad one for him, but he was a strong man, and always 
appeared cheery and kindly. It was then that lie 
was inspired to convert the old mill into a church. 
Lakelands was too poor to build one; and the stiM 
poorer mountaineers could not assist. There was no 
place of worship nearer than twenty miles. 

The miller altered the appearance of the mill as 
little as possible. The big overshot-wheel was left 
in its place. The young people who came to the church 
used to cut their initials in its soft and slowly decaying 
wood. The dam was p'artly destroyed, and the clear 
mountain stream rippled unchecked down its rock/ 
bed. Inside the mill the changes were greater. Tb 
shafts and millstones and belts and pulleys were, of 
course, all removed. There were two rows of benches 
with aisles between, and a little raised platform and 
pulpit at one end. On three sides overhead was a 
gallery containing seats, and reached by a stairway 
inside. There was also an organ a real pipe orgam 
in the gallery, that was the pride of the congrega- 
tion of the Old Mill Church. Miss Phoebe Summers 
was the organist. The Lakelands boys proudly took 
turns at pumping it for her at each Sunday's service. 
The Rev. Mr. Banbridge was the preacher, and rode 
down from Squirrel Gap on his old white horse withomt 
ever missing a service. And Abram Strong paid for 



184 Sixes and Sevens 

everything. He paid the preacher five hundred 
dollars a year; and Miss Phoebe two hundred dollars. 

Thus, in memory of Aglaia, the old mill was con- 
verted into a blessing for the community in which 
she had once lived. It seemed that the brief life of 
the child had brought about more good than the three 
score years and ten of many. But Abram Strong set 
up yet another monument to her memory. 

Out from his mills in the Northwest came the 
"Aglaia" flour, made from the hardest and finest 
wheat that could be raised. The country soon found 
out that the "Aglaia" flour had two prices. One was 
the highest market price, and the other was nothing. 

Wherever there happened a calamity that left 
people destitute a fire, a flood, a tornado, a strike, 
or a famine, there would go hurrying a generous con- 
signment of the "Aglaia" at its "nothing" price. It 
was given away cautiously and judiciously, but it 
was freely given, and not a penny could the hungry 
ones pay for it. There got to be a saying that whenever 
there was a disastrous fire in the poor districts of a city 
the fire chief's buggy reached the scene first, next the 
"Aglaia" flour wagon, and then the fire engines. 

So this was Abram Strong's other monument to 
Aglaia. Perhaps to a poet the theme may seem too 
utilitarian for beauty; but to some the fancy will 
seem sweet and fine that the pure, white, virgin flour, 
flying on its mission of love and charity, might be 



The Church with an Over shot-Wheel 185 

likened to the spirit of the lost child whose memory 
it signalized. 

There came a year that brought hard times to the 
Cumber-lands. Grain crops everywhere were light, 
and there were no local crops at all. Mountain floods 
had done much damage to property. Even game in the 
woods was so scarce that the hunters brought hardly 
enough home to keep their folk alive. Especially 
about Lakelands was the rigour felt. 

As soon as Abram Strong heard of this his messages 
flew ; and the little narrow-gauge cars began to unload 
"Aglaia" flour there. The miller's orders were to 
store the flour in the gallery of the Old Mill Church; 
and that every one who attended the church was to 
carry home a sack of it. 

Two weeks after that Abram Strong came for his 
yearly visit to the Eagle House, and became " Father 
Abram" again. 

That season the Eagle House had fewer guests 
than usual. Among them was Rose Chester. Miss 
Chester came to Lakelands from Atlanta, where she 
worked in a department store. This was the first 
vacation outing of her life. The wife of the store mana- 
ger had once spent a summer at the Eagle House. 
She had taken a fancy to Rose, and had persuaded 
her to go there for her three weeks' holiday. The 
manager's wife gave her a letter to Mrs. Rankin, who 
gladly received her in her own charge and care. 



186 Sixes and Sevens 

Miss Chester was not very strong. She was about 
twenty, and pale and delicate from an indoor life. 
But one week of Lakelands gave her a brightness and 
spirit that changed her wonderfully. The time was 
early September when the Cumberlands are at their 
greatest beauty. The mountain foliage was growing 
brilliant with autumnal colours; one breathed aerial 
champagne, the nights were deliciously cool, causing 
one to snuggle cosily under the warm blankets of 
the Eagle House. 

Father Abram and Miss Chester became great 
friends. The old miller learned her story from Mrs. 
Rankin, and his interest went out quickly to the slender, 
lonely girl who was making her own way in the world. 

The mountain country was new to Miss Chester. 
She had lived many years in the warm, flat town of 
Atlanta; and the grandeur and variety of the Cumber- 
l&nds delighted her. She was determined to enjoy 
crery moment of her stay. Her little hoard of savings 
had been estimated so carefully in connection with her 
expenses that she knew almost to a penny what her 
Tery small surplus would be when she returned to 
work. 

Miss Chester was fortunate in gaining Father 
Abram for a friend and companion. He knew every 
road and peak and slope of the mountains near Lake- 
lands. Through him she became acquainted with the 
solemn delight of the shadowy, tilted aisles of the 



The Church with an Over shot-Wheel 187 

pine forests, the dignity of the bare crags, the crystal, 
tonic mornings, the dreamy, golden afternoons full 
of mysterious sadness. So her health improved, 
and her spirits grew light. She had a laugh as genial 
and hearty in its feminine way as the famous laugh 
of Father Abram. Both of them were natural opti- 
mists; and both knew how to present a serene and 
cheerful face to the world. 

One day Miss Chester learned from one of the guests 
the history of Father Abram's lost child. Quickly 
she hurried away and found the miller seated on his 
favourite rustic bench near the chalybeate spring. 
He was surprised when his little fritend slipped her 
hand into his, and looked at him with tears in her 
eyes. 

"Oh, Father Abram," she said, "I'm so sorry! I 
didn't know until to-day about your little daughter. 
You will find her yet some day Oh, I hope you 
will." 

The miller looked down at her with his strong, 
ready smile. 

"Thank you, Miss Rose," he said, in his usual 
cheery tones. "But I do not expect to find Aglaia. 
For a few years I hoped that she had been stolen by 
vagrants, and that she still lived ; but I have lost that 
hope. I believe that she was drowned." 

"I can understand," said Miss Chester, "how the 
doubt must have made it so hard to bear. And yet 



188 Sixes and Sevens 

you are so cheerful and so ready to make other people's 
burdens light. Good Father Abram ! " 

"Good Miss Rose!" mimicked the miller, smiling. 
"Who thinks of others more than you do?" 

A whimsical mood seemed to strike Miss Chester. 

"Oh, Father Abram," she cried, "wouldn't it be 
grand if I should prove to be your daughter? Wouldn't 
it be romantic? And wouldn't you like to have me 
for a daughter?" 

"Indeed, I would," said the miller, heartily. "If 
Aglaia had lived I could wish for nothing better than 
for her to have grown up to be just such a little woman 
as you are. Maybe you are Aglaia," he continued, 
falling in with her playful mood ; " can't you remember 
when we lived at the mill? " 

Miss Chester fell swiftly into serious meditation. 
Her large eyes were fixed vaguely upon something 
in the distance. Father Abram was amused at her 
quick return to seriousness. She sat thus for a long 
time before she spoke. 

"No," she said at length, with a long sigh, "I can't 
remember anything at all about a mill. I don't 
think that I ever saw a flour mill in my life until I 
saw your funny little church. And if I were your little 
girl I would remember it, wouldn't I? I'm so sony, 
Father Abram." 

"So am I," said Father Abram, humouring her. 
"But if you cannot remember that you are my little 



The Church with an Over shot-Wheel 189 

girl, Miss Rose, surely you can recollect being some 
one else's. You remember your own parents, of 
course." 

"Oh, yes; I remember them very well especially 
my father. He wasn't a bit like you, Father Abram. 
Oh, I was only making believe. Come, now, you're 
rested long enough. You promised to show me the 
pool where you can see the trout playing, this after- 
noon. I never saw a trout." 

Late one afternoon Father Abram set out for the 
old mill alone. He often went to sit and think of the 
old days when he lived in the cottage across the road. 
Time had smoothed away the sharpness of his grief 
until he no longer found the memory of those times 
painful. But whenever Abram Strong sat in the 
melancholy September afternoons on the spot where 
"Dums" used to run in every day with her yellow 
curls flying, the smile that Lakelands always saw upon 
his face was not there. 

The miller made his way slowly up the winding, 
steep road. The trees crowded so close to the edge of 
it that he walked in their shade, with his hat in his 
hand. Squirrels ran playfully upon the old rail 
fence at his right. Quails were calling to their young 
broods in the wheat stubble. The low sun sent a 
torrent of pale gold up the ravine that opened to the 
west. Early September ! it was within a few days 
only of the anniversary of Aglaia's disappearance. 



190 /Sixes and Sevens 

The old overshot- wheel, half covered with mountain 
ivy, caught patches of the warm sunlight filtering 
through the trees. The cottage across the road was 
still standing, but it would doubtless go down before 
the next winter's mountain blasts. It was overrun 
with morning glory and wild gourd vines, and the 
door hung by one hinge. 

Father Abram pushed open the mill door, and 
entered softly. And then he stood still, wondering. 
He heard the sound of some one within, weeping 
inconsolably. He looked, and saw Miss Chester 
sitting in a dim pew, with her head bowed upon an 
open letter that her hands held. 

Father Abram went to her, and laid one of his 
strong hands firmly upon hers. She looked up, 
breathed his name, and tried to speak further. 

"Not yet, Miss Rose," said the miller, kindly. 
"Don't try to talk yet. There's nothing as good for 
you as a nice, quiet little cry when you are feeling 
blue." 

It seemed that the old miller, who had known so 
much sorrow himself, was a magician in driving it 
away from others. Miss Chester's sobs grew easier. 
Presently she took her little plain-bordered handker- 
chief and wiped away a drop or two that had fallen 
from her eyes upon Father Abram 's big hand. Then 
she looked up and smiled through her tears. Miss 
Chester could always smile before her tears had dried, 



The Church with an Over shot-Wheel 191 

just as Father Abram could smile through his own 
grief. In that way the two were very much alike. 

The miller asked her no questions; but by and by 
Miss Chester began to tell him. 

It was the old story that always seems so big and 
important to the young, and that brings reminiscent 
smiles to their elders. Love was the theme, as may 
be supposed. There was a young man in Atlanta, 
full of all goodness and the graces, who had discovered 
that Miss Chester also possessed these qualities above 
all other people in Atlanta or anywhere else from Green- 
land to Patagonia. She showed Father Abram the 
letter over which she had been weeping. It was a 
manly, tender letter, a little superlative and urgent, 
after the style of love letters written by young men 
full of goodness and the graces. He proposed for 
Miss Chester's hand in marriage at once. Life, he 
said, since her departure for a three-weeks' visit, was 
not to be endured. He begged for an immediate 
answer; and if it were favourable he promised to 
fly, ignoring the narrow-gauge railroad, at once to 
Lakelands. 

"And now where does the trouble come in?" asked 
the miller when he had read the letter. 

"1 cannot marry him," said Miss Chester. 

" Do you want to marry him? " asked Father Abram. 

"Oh, I love him," she answered, "but " Down 

went her head and she sobbed again. 



192 Sixes and Sevens 

i 
"Come, Miss Rose," said the miller; "you can give 

me your confidence. I do not question you, but I 
think you can trust me." 

"I do trust you," said the girl. " I will tell you why 
I must refuse Ralph. I am nobody; I haven't even 
a name; the name I call myself is a lie. Ralph is a 
noble man. I love him with all my heart, but I can 
never be his." 

"What talk is this?" said Father Abram. "You 
said that you remember your parents. Why do you 
say you have no name? I do not understand." 

"I do remember them," said Miss Chester. "I re- 
member them too well. My first recollections are 
of our life somewhere in the far South. We moved 
many times to different towns and states. I have 
picked cotton, and worked in factories, and have often 
gone without enough food and clothes. My mother 
was sometimes good to me; my father was always 
cruel, and beat me. I think they were both idle 
and unsettled. 

"One night when we were living in a little town on a 
river near Atlanta they had a great quarrel. It was 
while they were abusing and taunting each other 
that I learned oh, Father Abram, I learned that 
I didn't even have the right to be don't you un- 
derstand? I had no right even to a name; I was 
nobody. 

"I ran away that night. I walked to Atlanta and 



The Church with an Over shot-Wheel 193 

found work. I gave myself the name of Rose Chester, 
and have earned my own living ever since. Now 
you know why I cannot marry Ralph and, oh, I 
can never tell him why." 

Better than any sympathy, more helpful than pity, 
was Father Abram's depreciation of her woes. 

"Why, dear, dear! is that all?" he said. "Fie, fie! 
I thought something was in the way. If this perfect 
young man is a man at all he will not care a pinch 
of bran for your family tree. Dear Miss Rose, take 
my word for it, it is yourself he cares for. Tell him 
frankly, just as you have told me, and I'll warrant 
that he will laugh at your story, and think all the more 
of you for it." 

"I shall never tell him," said Miss Chester, sadly. 
"And I shall never marry him nor any one else. I 
have not the right." 

But they saw a long shadow come bobbing up the 
sunlit road. And then came a shorter one bobbing 
by its side; and presently two strange figures ap- 
proached the church. The long shadow was made by 
Miss Phoebe Summers, the organist, come to practise. 
Tommy Teague, aged twelve, was responsible for 
the shorter shadow. It was Tommy's day to pump 
the organ for Miss Phoebe, and his bare toes proudly 
spurned the dust of the road. 

Miss Phoebe, in her lilac-spray chintz dress, with her 
accurate little curls hanging over each ear, courtesied 



194 Sixes and Sevens 

low to Father Abram, and shook her curls ceremoni- 
ously at Miss Chester. Then she and her assistant 
climbed the steep stairway to the organ loft. 

In the gathering shadows below, Father Abram and 
Miss Chester lingered. They were silent; and it is 
likely that they were busy with their memories. Miss 
Chester sat, leaning her head on her hand, with her 
eyes fixed far away. Father Abram stood in the next 
pew, looking thoughtfully out of the door at the 
road and the mined cottage. 

Suddenly the scene was transformed for him back 
almost a score of years into the past. For, as Tommy 
pumped away, Miss Phcebe struck a low bass note 
on the organ and held it to test the volume of air 
that it contained. The church ceased to exist, so 
far as Father Abram was concerned. The deep, 
booming vibration that shook the little frame building 
was no note from an organ, but the humming of the 
mill machinery. He felt sure that the old overshot 
wheel was turning; that he was back again, a dusty, 
merry miller in the old mountain mill. And now 
evening was come, and soon would come Aglaia with 
flyiag colours, toddling across the road to take him 
home to supper. Father Abram's eyes were fixed 
upon the broken door of the cottage. 

And then came another wonder. In the gallery 
overhead the sacks of flour were stacked in long rows. 
Perhaps a mouse had been at one of them; anyway 



The Church with an (her shot-Wheel 195 

the jar of the deep organ note shook down between 
the cracks of the gallery floor a stream of flour, cover- 
ing Father Abrain from head to foot with the white 
dust. And then the old miller stepped into the aisle, 
and waved his arms and began to sing the miller's 
song: 

"The wheel gees round, 
The grist is ground. 

The dusty miller's merry." 

and then the rest of the miracle happened. Miss 
Chester was leaning forward from her pew, as pale 
as the flour itself, her wide-open eyes staring at Father 
Abram like one in a waking dream. When he began 
the song she stretched out her arms to him; her lips 
moved; she called to him in dreamy tones: "Da-da, 
come take Dums home!" 

Miss Phoebe released the low key of the organ. 
But her work had been well done. The note that she 
struck had beaten down the doors of a closed meiaory; 
and Father Abram held his lost Aglaia close in his 
arms. 

When you visit Lakelands they will tell you more 
of this story. They will tell you how the lines of it 
were afterward traced, and the history of the miller's 
daughter revealed after the gipsy wanderers had 
stolen her on that September day, attracted by her 
childish beauty. But you skell wait until you sit 
comfortably on the shaded porch of the Eagle House, 



196 Sixes and Sevens 

and then you can have the story at your ease. It 
seems best that our part of it should close while Miss 
Phoebe's deep bass note was yet reverberating softly. 

And yet, to my mind, the finest thing of it all hap- 
pened while Father Abram and his daughter were 
walking back to the Eagle House in the long twilight, 
almost too glad to speak. 

"Father," she said, somewhat timidly and doubt- 
fully, " have you a great deal of money? " 

"A great deal?" said the miller. "Well, that de- 
pends. There is plenty unless you want to buy the 
moon or something equally expensive." 

"Would it cost very, very much," asked Aglaia, 
who had always counted her dimes so carefully, "to 
send a telegram to Atlanta?" 

"Ah," said Father Abram, with a little sigh, "I 
see. You want to ask Ralph to come." 

Aglaia looked up at him with a tender smile. 

"I want to ask him to wait," she said. "I have 
just found my father, and I want it to be just we two 
for a while. I want to tell him he will have to wait." 



XVII 
NEW YORK BY CAMP FIRE LIGHT 

AWAY out in the Creek Nation we learned things 
about New York. 

We were on a hunting trip, and were camped one 
night on the bank of a little stream. Bud Kingsbury 
was our skilled hunter and guide, and it was from his 
lips that we had explanations of Manhattan and the 
queer folks that inhabit it. Bud had once spent a 
month in the metropolis, and a week or two at other 
times, and he was pleased to discourse to us of what 
he had seen. 

Fifty yards away from our camp was pitched the 
teepee of a wandering family of Indians that had 
come up and settled there for the night. An old, 
old Indian woman was trying to build a fire under 
an iron pot hung upon three sticks. 

Bud went over to her assistance, and soon had her 
fire going. When he came back we complimented 
him playfully upon his gallantry. 

"Oh," said Bud, "don't mention it. It's a way I 
have. Whenever I see a lady trying to cook things 
in a pot and having trouble I always go to the rescue. 

197 



198 Sixes and Sevens 

I done the same thing once in a high-toned house in 
New York City. Heap big society teepee on Fifth 
Avenue. That Injun lady kind of recalled it to my 
mind. Yes, I endeavours to be polite and help the 
ladies out." 

The camp demanded the particulars. 

"I was manager of the Triangle B Ranch in the 
Panhandle," said Bud. "It was owned at that time 
by old man Sterling, of New York. He wanted to 
sell out, and he wrote for me to come on to New York 
and explain the ranch to the syndicate that wanted 
to buy. So I sends to Fort Worth and has a forty 
dollar suit of clothes made, and hits the trail for the big 
Tillage. 

"Well, when I got there, old man Sterling and his 
outfit certainly laid themselves out to be agreeable. 
We had business and pleasure so mixed up that you 
couldn't tell whether it was a treat or a trade hah* 
tte time. We had trolley rides, and cigars, and 
theatre round-ups, and rubber parties." 

"Rubber parties?" said a listener, inquiringly. 

"Sure," said Bud. "Didn't you never attend 'em? 
You walk around and try to look at the tops of the 
skyscrapers. Well, we sold the ranch, and old man 
Sterling asks me 'round to his house to take grub on 
the night before I started back. It wasn't any high- 
oollared affair just me and the old man and his 
wife and daughter. But they was a fine-haired outfit 



New York by Camp Fire Light 199 

all right, and the lilies of the field wasn't in it. They 
made my Fort Worth clothes carpenter look like a 
dealer in horse blankets and gee strings. And then 
the table was all pompous with flowers, and there was 
a whole kit of tools laid out beside everybody's plate. 
You'd have thought you was fixed out to burglarize 
a restaurant before you could get your grub. But 
I'd been in New York over a week then, and I was 
getting on to stylish ways. I kind of trailed behind 
and watched the others use the hardware supplies, 
and then I tackled the chuck with the same weapons. 
It ain't much trouble to travel with the high-flyers 
after you find out their gait. I got along fine. I 
was feeling cool and agreeable, and pretty soon I was 
talking away fluent as you please, all about the ranch 
and the West, and telling 'em how the Indians eat 
grasshopper stew and snakes, and you never saw 
people so interested. 

"But the real joy of that feast was that Miss Ster- 
ling. Just a little trick she was, not bigger than two 
bits worth of chewing plug; but she had a way about 
her that seemed to say she was the people, and you 
believed it. And yet, she never put on any airs, and 
she smiled at me the same as if I was a millionaire 
while I was telling about a Creek dog feast and listened 
like it was news from home. 

"By and by, after we had eat oysters and some 
watery soup and truck that never was in my repertory, 



200 Sixes and Sevens 

a Methodist preacher brings in a kind of camp stove 
arrangement, all silver, on long legs, with a lamp 
under it. 

"Miss Sterling lights up and begins to do some 
cooking right on the supper table. I wondered why 
old man Sterling didn't hire a cook, with all the money 
he had. Pretty soon she dished out some cheesy 
tasting truck that she said was rabbit, but I swear 
there had never been a Molly cotton tail in a mile of 
it. 

"The last thing on the programme was lemonade. 
It was brought around in little flat glass bowls and set 
by your plate. I was pretty thirsty, and I picked up 
mine and took a big swig of it. Right there was 
where the little lady had made a mistake. She had 
put in the lemon all right, but she'd forgot the sugar. 
The best housekeepers slip up sometimes. I thought 
maybe Miss Sterling was just learning to keep house 
and cook that rabbit would surely make you think 
so and I says to myself, 'Little lady, sugar or no 
sugar I'll stand by you,' and I raises up my bowl 
again and drinks the last drop of the lemonade. And 
then all the balance of 'em picks up their bowls and 
does the same. And then I gives Miss Sterling the 
laugh proper, just to carry it off like a joke, so she 
wouldn't feel bad about the mistake. 

"After we all went into the sitting room ske sat 
down and talked to me quite awhile. 



New York by Camp Fire Light 201 

"'It was so kind of you, Mr. Kingsbury,' says she, 
*to bring my blunder off so nicely. It was so stupid 
of me to forget the sugar.' 

"'Never you mind,' says I, 'some lucky man will 
throw his rope over a mighty elegant little house- 
keeper some day, not far from here.' 

'"If you mean me, Mr. Kingsbury,' says she, 
laughing out loud, 'I hope he will be as lenient with 
my poor housekeeping as you have been.' 

"'Don't mention it,' says I. 'Anything to oblige 
the ladies.'" 

Bud ceased his reminiscences. And then some one 
asked him what he considered the most striking and 
prominent trait of New Yorkers. 

"The most visible and peculiar trait of New York 
folks," answered Bud, "is New York. Most of 'em 
has New York on the brain. They have heard of 
other places, such as Waco, and Paris, and Hot Springs, 
and London; but they don't believe in 'em. They 
think that town is all Merino. Now to show you how 
much they care for their village I'll tell you about 
one of 'em that strayed out as far as the Triangle 
B while I was working there. 

"This New Yorker come out there looking for a 
job on the ranch. He said he was a good horseback 
rider, and there was pieces of tanbark hanging on his 
clothes yet from his riding school. 

"Well, for a while they put him to keeping books in 



202 Sixes ana Sevens 

the ranch store, for he was a devil at figures. But 
he got tired of that, and asked for something more 
in the line of activity. The boys on the ranch liked 
him all right, but he made us tired shouting New 
York all the time. Every night he'd tell us about 
East River and J. P. Morgan and the Eden Musee 
and Hetty Green and Central Park till we used to 
throw tin plates and branding irons at him. 

"One day this chap gets on a pitching pony, and 
the pony kind of sidled up his back and went to eating 
grass while the New Yorker was coming down. 

"He come down on his head on a chunk of mesquit 
wood, and he didn't show any designs toward getting 
up again. We laid him out in a tent, and he begun 
to look pretty dead. So Gideon Pease saddles up and 
burns the wind for old Doc Sleeper's residence in 
Dogtown, thirty miles away. 

"The doctor comes over and he investigates the 
patient. 

"Boys,' says he, 'you might as well go to playing 
seven-up for his saddle and clothes, for his head's 
fractured and if he lives ten minutes it will be a re- 
markable case of longevity/ 

"Of course we didn't gamble for the poor rooster's 
saddle that was one of Doc's jokes. But we stood 
around feeling solemn, and all of us forgive him for 
haying talked us to death about New York. 

"I never saw anybody about to hand in his checks 



New York by Camp Fire Light 203 

act more peaceful than this fellow. His eyes were 
fixed 'way up in the air, and he was using rambling 
words to himself all about sweet music and beautiful 
streets and white-robed forms, and he was smiling 
like dying was a pleasure. 

"'He's about gone now,' said Doc. 'Whenever 
they begin to think they see heaven it's all off.' 

"Blamed if that New York man didn't sit right up 
when he heard the Doc say that. 

"'Say,' says he, kind of disappointed, 'was that 
heaven? Confound it all, I thought it was Broadway. 
Some of you fellows get my clothes. I'm going to 
get up.' 

"And I'll be blamed," concluded Bud, "if he 
wasn't on the train with a ticket for New York in his 
pocket four days afterward!" 



XVIII 
THE ADVENTURES OF SHAMROCK JOLNES 

I AM so fortunate as to count Shamrock Jolnes, the 
great New York detective, among my muster of 
friends. Jolnes is what is called the "inside man" 
of the city detective force. He is an expert in the 
use of the typewriter, and it is his duty, whenever 
there is a "murder mystery" to be solved, to sit at a 
desk telephone at headquarters and take down the 
messages of "cranks" who 'phone in their confessions 
to having committed the crime. 

But on certain "off" days when confessions are 
coming in slowly and three or four newspapers have 
run to earth as many different guilty persons, Jolnes 
will knock about the town with me, exhibiting, to 
my great delight and instruction, his marvellous powers 
of observation and deduction. 

The other day I dropped in at Headquarters and 
found the great detective gazing thoughtfully at a 
string that was tied tightly around his little finger. 

"Good morning, Whatsup," he said, without turning 
his head. "I'm glad to notice that you've had your 
house fitted up with electric lights at last." 

204 



The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes 205 

"Will you please tell me," I said, in surprise, "how 
you knew that? I am sure that I never mentioned 
the fact to any one, and the wiring was a rush order 
not completed until this morning." 

"Nothing easier," said Jolnes, genially. "As you 
came in I caught the odour of the cigar you are smoking. 
I know an expensive cigar; and I know that not 
more than three men in New York can afford to 
smoke cigars and pay gas bills too at the present time. 
That was an easy one. But I am working just now 
on a little problem of my own." 

"Why have you that string on your finger?" I 
asked. 

"That's the problem," said Jolnes. "My wife 
tied that on this morning to remind me of something 
I was to send up to the house. Sit down, Whatsup, 
and excuse me for a few moments." 

The distinguished detective went to a wall telephone, 
and stood with the receiver to his ear for probably 
ten minutes. 

"Were you listening to a confession?" I asked, 
when he had returned to his chair. 

"Perhaps," said Jolnes, with a smile, "it might be 
called something of the sort. To be frank with you, 
Whatsup, I've cut out the dope. I've been increasing 
the quantity for so long that morphine doesn't have 
much effect on me any more. I've got to have some- 
thing more powerful. That telephone I just went 



206 Sixes and Sevens 

to is connected with a room in the Waldorf where 
there's an author's reading in progress. Now, to 
get at the solution of this string." 

After five minutes of silent pondering, Jolnes looked 
at me, with a smile, and nodded his head. 

"Wonderful man!" I exclaimed; "already?" 

"It is quite simple," he said, holding up his finger. 
" You see that knot? That is to prevent my forgetting. 
It is, therefore, a forget-me-knot. A forget-me-not 
is a flower. It was a sack of flour that I was to send 
home!" 

" Beautiful ! " I could not help crying out in admira- 
tion. 

"Suppose we go out for a ramble," suggested Jolnes. 

"There is only one case of importance on hand just 
now. Old man McCarty, one hundred and four 
years old, died from eating too many bananas. The 
evidence points so strongly to the Mafia that the 
police have surrounded the Second Avenue Katzen- 
jammer Gambrinus Club No. 2, and the capture of 
the assassin is only the matter of a few hours. The 
detective force has not yet been called on for assist- 
ance." 

Jolnes and I went out and up the street toward the 
corner, where we were to catch a surface car. 

Half-way up the block we met Rheingelder, an 
acquaintance of ours, who held a City Hall position. 

"Good morning, Rheingelder," said Jolnes, halting. 



The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes 207 

"Nice breakfast that was you had this morning." 

Always on the lookout for the detective's remark- 
able feats of deduction, I saw Jolnes's eye flash for 
an instant upon a long yellow splash on the shirt 
bosom and a smaller one upon the chin of Rhein- 
gelder both undoubtedly made by the yolk of an egg. 

"Oh, dot is some of your detectiveness," said Rhein- 
gelder, shaking all over with a smile. "Veil, I pet 
you trinks und cigars all round dot you cannot tell vot 
I haf eaten for breakfast." 

"Done," said Jolnes. "Sausage, pumpernickel and 
coffee." 

Rheingelder admitted the correctness of the surmise 
and paid the bet. When we had proceeded on our 
way I said to Jolnes: 

" I thought you looked at the egg spilled on his chin 
and shirt front." 

"I did," said Jolnes. "That is where I began my 
deduction. Rheingelder is a very economical, saving 
man. Yesterday eggs dropped in the market to 
twenty-eight cents per dozen. To-day they are 
quoted at forty-two. Rheingelder ate eggs yesterday, 
and to-day he went back to his usual fare. A little 
thing like this isn't anything, Whatsup; it belongs to 
the primary arithmetic class." 

When we boarded the street car we found the seats 
all occupied principally by ladies. Jolnes and I 
stood on the rear platform. 



208 Sixes and Sevens 

About the middle of the car there sat an elderly 
man with a short, gray beard, who looked to be the 
typical, well-dressed New Yorker. At successive 
corners other ladies climbed aboard, and soon three 
or four of them were standing over the man, clinging 
to straps and glaring meaningly at the man who 
occupied the coveted seat. But he resolutely re- 
tained his place. 

"We New Yorkers," I remarked to Jolnes, "have 
about lost our manners, as far as the exercise of them 
in public goes." 

"Perhaps so," said Jolnes, lightly; "but the man 
you evidently refer to happens to be a very chivalrous 
and courteous gentleman from Old Virginia. He is 
spending a few days in New York with his wife and 
two daughters, and he leaves for the South to-night." 

"You know him, then?" I said, in amazement. 

"I never saw him before we stepped on the car," 
declared the detective, smilingly. 

"By the gold tooth of the Witch of Endor!" I 
cried, "if you can construe all that from his appearance 
you are dealing in nothing else than black art." 

"The habit of observation nothing more," said 
Jolnes. "If the old gentleman gets off the car before 
we do, I think I can demonstrate to you the accuracy 
of my deduction." 

Three blocks farther along the gentleman rose to 
leave the car. Jolnes addressed him at the door: 



The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes 209 

"Pardon me, sir, but are you not Colonel Hunter, of 
Norfolk, Virginia?" 

"No, suh," was the extremely courteous answer. 
"My name, suh, is Ellison Major Winfield R. 
Ellison, from Fairfax County, in the same state. I 
know a good many people, suh, in Norfolk the 
Goodriches, the Tollivers, and the Crabtrees, suh, 
but I never had the pleasure of meeting yo' friend, 
Colonel Hunter. I am happy to say, suh, that I am 
going back to Virginia to-night, after having spent a 
week in yo' city with my wife and three daughters. 
I shall be in Norfolk in about ten days, and if you 
will give me yo' name, suh, I will take pleasure in 
looking up Colonel Hunter and telling him that you 
inquired after him, suh." 

"Thank you," said Jolnes; "tell him that Reynolds 
sent his regards, if you will be so kind." 

I glanced at the great New York detective and saw 
that a look of intense chagrin had come upon his 
slear-cut features. Failure in the slightest point al- 
ways galled Shamrock Jolnes. 

"Did you say your three daughters?" he asked of 
the Virginia gentleman. 

"Yes, suh, my three daughters, all as fine girls as 
there are in Fairfax County," was the answer. 

With that Major Ellison stopped the car and began 
to descend the step. 

Shamrock Jolnes clutched his arm. 



210 Sixes and Sevens 

"One moment, sir," he begged, in an urbane voice 
in which I alone detected the anxiety "am I not 
right in believing that one of the young ladies is an 
adopted daughter?" 

"You are, suh," admitted the major, from the 
ground, "but how the devil you knew it, suh, is mo' 
than I can tell." 

"And mo' than I can tell, too," I said, as the car 
went on. 

Jolnes was restored to his calm, observant serenity 
by having wrested victory from his apparent failure; 
so after we got off the car he invited me into a cafe, 
promising to reveal the process of his latest wonderful 
feat. 

"In the first place," he began after we were com- 
fortably seated, "I knew the gentleman was no New 
Yorker because he was flushed and uneasy and restless 
on account of the ladies that were standing, although 
he did not rise and give them his seat. I decided 
from his appearance that he was a Southerner rather 
than a Westerner. 

"Next I began to figure out his reason for not re- 
linquishing his seat to a lady when he evidently felt 
strongly, but not overpoweringly, impelled to do so. 
I very quickly decided upon that. I noticed that 
one of his eyes had received a severe jab in one corner, 
which was red and inflamed, and that all over his face 
were tiny round marks about the size of the end 



The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes 

of an uncut lead pencil. Also upon both of his patent 
leather shoes were a number of deep imprints shaped 
like ovals cut off square at one end. 

"Now, there is only one district in New York City 
where a man is bound to receive scars and wounds 
and indentations of that sort and that is along the 
sidewalks of Twenty -third Street and a portion of 
Sixth Avenue south of there. I knew from the im- 
prints of trampling French heels on his feet and the 
marks of countless jabs in the face from umbrellas 
and parasols carried by women in the shopping dis- 
trict that he had been in conflict with the amazonian 
troops. And as he was a man of intelligent appear- 
ance, I knew he would not have braved such dangers 
unless he had been dragged thither by his own women 
folk. Therefore, when he got on the car his anger 
at the treatment he had received was sufficient to 
make him keep his seat in spite of his traditions of 
Southern chivalry." 

"That is all very well," I said, "but why did you 
insist upon daughters and especially two daughters? 
Why couldn't a wife alone have taken him shopping?" 

"There had to be daughters," said Jolnes, calmly. 
"If he had only a wife, and she near his own age, he 
could have bluffed her into going alone. If he had a 
young wife she would prefer to go alone. So there 
you are." 

"I'll admit that," I said; "but, now, why two 



Sixes and Sevens 

daughters? And how, in the name of all the prophets, 
did you guess that one was adopted when he told 
you he had three? " 

"Don't say guess," said Jolnes, with a touch of 
pride in his air; "there is no such word in the lexicon 
of ratiocination. In Major Ellison's buttonhole there 
was a carnation and a rosebud backed by a geranium 
leaf. No woman ever combined a carnation and a 
rosebud into a boutonniere. Close your eyes, Whatsup, 
and give the logic of your imagination a chance. 
Cannot you see the lovely Adele fastening the carna- 
tion to the lapel so that papa may be gay upon the 
street? And then the romping Edith May dancing 
up with sisterly jealousy to add her rosebud to the 
adornment?" 

"And then," I cried, beginning to feel enthusiasm, 
"when he declared that he had three daughters" 

"I could see," said Jolnes, "one in the background 
who added no flower; and I knew that she must 
be- 

" Adopted!" I broke in. "I give you every 
credit; but how did you know he was leaving for the 
South to-night?" 

"In his breast pocket," said the great detective, 
"something large and oval made a protuberance. 
Good liquor is scarce on trains, and it is a long journey 
from New York to Fairfax County." 

"Again, I must bow to you," I said. "And tell 



The Adventures of Shamrock Jolnes 213 

me this, so that my last shred of doubt will be 
cleared away; why did you decide that he was from 
Virginia?" 

"It was very faint, I admit," answered Shamrock 
Jolnes, "but no trained observer could have failed 
to detect the odour of mint in the car. ' 



XIX 
THE LADY HIGHER UP 

NEW YORK CITY, they said, was deserted; and 
that accounted, doubtless, for the sounds carrying so 
far in the tranquil summer air. The breeze was south- 
by-southwest; the hour was midnight; the theme was 
a bit of feminine gossip by wireless mythology. Three 
hundred and sixty-five feet above the heated asphalt 
the tiptoeing symbolic deity on Manhattan pointed 
her vacillating arrow straight, for the time, in the 
direction of her exalted sister on Liberty Island. The 
lights of the great Garden were out; the benches in 
the Square were filled with sleepers in postures so 
strange that beside them the writhing figures in Dore's 
illustrations of the Inferno would have straightened 
into tailor's dummies. The statue of Diana on the 
tower of the Garden its constancy shown by its 
weathercock ways, its innocence by the coating of 
gold that it has acquired, its devotion to style by its 
single, graceful flying scarf, its candour and artlessness 
by its habit of ever drawing the long bow, its metro- 
politanism by its posture of swift flight to catch a 
Harlem train remained poised with its arrow pointed 

214 



The Lady Higher Up 215 

across the upper bay. Had that arrow sped truly and 
horizontally it would have passed fifty feet above the 
head of the heroic matron whose duty it is to offer 
a cast-ironical welcome to the oppressed of other lands. 

Seaward this lady gazed, and the furrows between 
steamship lines began to cut steerage rates. The 
translators, too, have put an extra burden upon her. 
" Liberty Lighting the World " (as her creator christ- 
ened her) would have had a no more responsible duty, 
except for the size of it, than that of an electrician or 
a Standard Oil magnate. But to "enlighten" the 
world (as our learned civic guardians "Englished" it) 
requires abler qualities. And so poor Liberty, instead 
of having a sinecure as a mere illuminator, must be 
converted into a Chautauqua schoolma'am, with the 
oceans for her field instead of the placid, classic lake. 
With a fireless torch and an empty head must she dis- 
pel the shadows of the world and teach it its A, B, C's. 

"Ah, there, Mrs. Liberty!" called a clear, rollick- 
ing soprano voice through the still, midnight air. 

"Is that you, Miss Diana? Excuse my not turning 
my head. I'm not as flighty and whirly-whirly as some. 
And 'tis so hoarse I am I can hardly talk on account 
of the peanut-hulls left on the stairs in me throat by 
that last boatload of tourists from Marietta, Ohio. 
"Tis after being a fine evening, miss. " 

" If you don't mind my asking, " came the bell-like 
tones of the golden statue, "I'd like to know where 



216 Sixes and Sevens 

you got that City Hall brogue. I didn't know that 
Liberty was necessarily Irish. " 

"If ye'd studied the history of art in its foreign 
complications ye'd not need to ask," replied the 
offshore statue. "If ye wasn't so light-headed and 
giddy ye'd know that I was made by a Dago and pre- 
sented to the American people on behalf of the French 
Government for the purpose of welcomin' Irish 
immigrants into the Dutch city of New York. 'TLs 
that I've been doing night and day since I was erected. 
Ye must know, Miss Diana, that 'tis with statues the 
same as with people 'tis not their makers nor the 
purposes for which they were created that influence 
the operations of their tongues at all it's the asso- 
ciations with which they become associated, I'm telling 

ye." 

"You're dead right," agreed Diana. "I notice it 
on myself. If any of the old guys from Olympus were 
to come along and hand me any hot air in the ancient 
Greek I couldn't tell it from a conversation between 
a Coney Island car conductor and a five-cent fare. " 

"I'm right glad ye've made up your mind to be 
sociable, Miss Diana," said Mrs. Liberty. "'TLs a 
lonesome life I have down here. Is there anything 
doin' up in the city, Miss Diana, dear?" 

"Oh, la, la, la! no," said Diana. "Notice that 
'la, la, la,' Aunt Liberty? Got that from 'Paris by 
Night' on the roof garden under me. You'll hear that 



The Lady Higher Up 217 

'la, la, la' at the Cafe McCann now, along with 'gar- 
song.' The bohemian crowd there have become tired 
of 'garsong' since O'Rafferty, the head waiter, punched 
three of them for calling him it. Oh, no; the town's 
strickly on the bum these nights. Everybody's 
away. Saw a downtown merchant on a roof garden 
this evening with his stenographer. Show was so dull 
he went to sleep. A waiter biting on a dime tip to 
see if it was good half woke him up. He looks around 
and sees his little pothooks perpetrator. 'H'm!' 
says he, 'will you take a letter, Miss De St. Mont- 
morency?' 'Sure, in a minute,' says she, 'if you'll 
make it an X.' 

"That was the best thing happened on the roof. 
So you see how dull it is. La, la, la!" 

" 'Tis fine ye have it up there in society, Miss Diana. 
Ye have the cat show and the horse show and the 
military tournaments where the privates look grand 
as generals and the generals try to look grand as 
floor-walkers. And ye have the Sportsmen's Show, 
where the girl that measures 36, 19, 45 cooks breakfast 
food in a birch-bark wigwam on the banks of the Grand 
Canal of Venice conducted by one of the Vanderbilts, 
Bernard McFadden, and the Reverends Dowie and 
Duss. And ye have the French ball, where the origi- 
nal Cohens and the Robert Emmet-Sangerbund Society 
dance the Highland fling one with another. And 
ye have the grand O'Ryan ball, which is the most 



218 Sixes and Sevens 

beautiful pageant in the world, where the French 
students vie with the Tyrolean warblers in doin* 
the cake walk. Ye have the best job for a statue in 
the whole town, Miss Diana." 

" 'Tis weary work," sighed the island statue, "dis- 
seminatin' the science of liberty in New York Bay. 
Sometimes when I take a peep down at Ellis Island 
and see the gang of immigrants I'm supposed to light 
up, 'tis tempted I am to blow out the gas and let the 
coroner write out their naturalization papers." 

"Say, it's a shame, ain't it, to give you the worst 
end of it?" came the sympathetic antiphony of the 
steeplechase goddess. "It must be awfully lonesome 
down there with so much water around you. I don't 
see how you ever keep your hair in curl. And that 
Mother Hubbard you are wearing went out ten years 
ago. I think those sculptor guys ought to be held for 
damages for putting iron or marble clothes on a lady. 
That's where Mr. St. Gaudens was wise. I'm always 
a little ahead of the styles; but they're coming my way 
pretty fast. Excuse my back a moment I caught 
a pun* of wind from the north shouldn't wonder if 
things had loosened up in Esopus. There, now! it's 
in the West I should think that gold plank would 
have calmed the air out in that direction. What were 
you saying, Mrs. Liberty? " 

"A fine chat I've had with ye, Miss Diana, ma'am, 
but I see one of them European steamers a-sailin' 



The Lady Higher Up 219 

up the Narrows, and I must be attendin' to me duties. 
'Tis me job to extend aloft the torch of Liberty to 
welcome all them that survive the kicks that the 
steerage stewards give 'em while landin.' Sure 'tis 
a great country ye can come to for $8.50, and the doctor 
waitin' to send ye back home free if he sees yer eyes 
red from cry in' for it. " 

The golden statue veered in the changing breeze, 
menacing many points on the horizon with its aureate 
arrow. 

"So long, Aunt Liberty," sweetly called Diana of 
the Tower. "Some night, when the wind's right, I'll 
call you up again. But say! you haven't got 
such a fierce kick coming about your job. I've kept a 
pretty good watch on the island of Manhattan since 
I've been up here. That's a pretty sick-looking 
bunch of liberty chasers they dump down at your end 
of it; but they don't all stay that way. Every little 
while up here I see guys signing checks and voting the 
right ticket, and encouraging the arts and taking a 
bath every morning, that was shoved ashore by a 
dock labourer born in the United States who never 
earned over forty dollars a month. Don't run down 
your job, Aunt Liberty; you're all right, all right." 



XX 

THE GREATER CONEY 

"NEXT Sunday, " said Dennis Carnahan, "I'll be after 
going down to see the new Coney Island that's risen 
like a phoenix bird from the ashes of the old resort. 
I'm going with Norah Flynn, and we'll fall victims 
to all the dry goods deceptions, from the red-flannel 
eruption of Mount Vesuvius to the pink silk ribbons 
on the race-suicide problems in the incubator kiosk. 

"Was I there before? I was. I was there last 
Tuesday. Did I see the sights? I did not. 

"Last Monday I amalgamated myself with the Brick- 
layers' Union, and in accordance with the rules I was 
ordered to quit work the same day on account of a 
sympathy strike with the Lady Salmon Canners' 
Lodge No. 2, of Tacoma, Washington. 

" 'Twas disturbed I was in mind and proclivities by 
losing me job, bein' already harassed in me soul on 
account of bavin' quarrelled with Norah Flynn a week 
before by reason of hard words spoken at the Dairymen 
and Street-Sprinkler Drivers' semi-annual ball, caused 
by jealousy and prickly heat and that divil, Andy 
Coghlin. 

MO 



The Greater Coney 221 

"So, I says, it will be Coney for Tuesday; and if 
the chutes and the short change and the green-corn 
silk between the teeth don't create diversions and get 
me feeling better, then I don't know at all. 

' ' Ye will have heard that Coney has received moral 
reconstruction. The old Bowery, where they used 
to take your tintype by force and give ye knockout 
drops before having your palm read, is now called 
the Wall Street of the island. The wienerwurst stands 
are required by law to keep a news ticker in 'em; and 
the doughnuts are examined every four years by a 
retired steamboat inspector. The nigger man's head 
that was used by the old patrons to throw baseballs 
at is now illegal; and, by order of the Police Com- 
missioner the image of a man drivin' an automobile 
has been substituted. I hear that the old immoral 
amusements have been suppressed. People who used 
to go down from New York to sit in the sand and dabble 
in the surf now give up their quarters to squeeze 
through turnstiles and see imitations of city fires and 
floods painted on canvas. The reprehensible and de- 
gradin' resorts that disgraced old Coney are said to 
be wiped out. The wipin'-out process consists of 
raisin' the price from 10 cents to 25 cents, and hirin' a 
blonde named Maudie to sell tickets instead of Micky, 
the Bowery Bite. That's what they say I don't 
know. 

"But to Coney I goes a-Tuesday. I gets off the 



222 Sixes and Sevens 

'L' and starts for the glitterin* show. 'Twas a fine 
sight. The Babylonian towers and the Hindoo roof 
gardens was blazin' with thousands of electric lights, 
and the streets was thick with people. 'Tis a true 
thing they say that Coney levels all rank. I see 
millionaires eatin' popcorn and trampin' along with 
the crowd; and I see eight-dollar-a-week clothin'- 
store clerks in red automobiles fightin' one another 
for who'd squeeze the horn when they come to a corner. 

" 'I made a mistake,' I says to myself. 'Twas 
not Coney I needed. When a man's sad 'tis not scenes 
of hilaiity he wants. 'Twould be far better for him 
to meditate in a graveyard or to attend services at 
the Paradise Roof Gardens. 'Tis no consolation 
when a man's lost his sweetheart to order hot corn 
and have the waiter bring him the powdered sugar 
cruet instead of salt and then conceal himself, or to 
have Zozookum, the gipsy palmist, tell him that he 
has three children and to look out for another serious 
calamity; price twenty-five cents. 

" I walked far away down on the beach, to the ruins 
of an old pavilion near one corner of this new private 
park, Dreamland. A year ago that old pavilion was 
standin' up straight and the old-style waiters was 
slammin' a week's supply of clam chowder down in 
front of you for a nickel and callin' you 'cully' friendly, 
and vice was rampant, and you got back to New York 
with enough change to take a car at the bridge. Now 



The Greater Corny 

they tell me that they serve Welsh rabbits on Surf 
Avenue, and you get the right change back in the 
movin'-picture joints. 

"I sat down at one side of the old pavilion and looked 
at the surf spreadin' itself on the beach, and thought 
about the time me and Norah Flynn sat on that spot 
last summer. 'Twas before reform struck the island; 
and we was happy. We had tintypes and chowder in 
the ribald dives, and the Egyptian Sorceress of the 
Nile told Norah out of her hand, while I was waitin' hi 
the door, that 'twould be the luck of her to marry a 
red-headed gossoon with two crooked legs, and I was 
overrunnin' with joy on account of the allusion. And 
'twas there that Norah Flynn put her two hands in 
mine a year before and we talked of flats and the things 
she could cook and the love business that goes with 
such episodes. And that was Coney as we loved it, 
and as the hand of Satan was upon it, friendly and 
noisy and your money's worth, with no fence around 
the ocean and not too many electric lights to show the 
sleeve of a black serge coat against a white shirtwaist. 

"I sat with my back to the parks where they had 
the moon and the dreams and the steeples corralled, 
and longed for the old Coney. There wasn't many 
people on the beach. Lots of them was feedin' 
pennies into the slot machines to see the 'Interrupted 
Courtship' in the movin' pictures; and a good many 
was takin' the sea air in the Canals of Venice and some 



224 Sixes and Sevens 

was breathin' the smoke of the sea battle by actual 
warships in a tank filled with real water. A few was 
down on the sands enjoyin* the moonlight and the 
water. And the heart of me was heavy for the new 
morals of the old island, while the bands behind me 
played and the sea pounded on the bass drum in 
front. 

"And directly I got up and walked along the old 
pavilion, and there on the other side of, half in the 
dark, was a slip of a girl sittin' on the tumble-down 
timbers, and unless I'm a liar she was cryin' by herself 
there, all alone. 

'"Is it trouble you are in, now, Miss,' says I; 'and 
what's to be done about it?' 

' 'Tis none of your business at all, Denny Carna- 
han,' says she, sittin' up straight. And it was the 
voice of no other than Norah Flynn. 

"Then it's not,' says I, 'and we're after having a 
pleasant evening, Miss Flynn. Have ye seen the 
sights of this new Coney Island, then? I presume ye 
have come here for that purpose,' says I. 

"'I have,' says she. 'Me mother and Uncle Tim 
they are waiting beyond. 'Tis an elegant evening 
I've had. I've seen all the attractions that be.' 

'"Right ye are,' says I to Norah; and I don't know 
when I've been that amused. After disportin' me- 
self among the most laughable moral improvements 
of the revised shell games I took ineself to the shore 



The Greater Coney 225 

for the benefit of the cool air. 'And did ye observe 
the Durbar, Miss Flynn?' 

"'I did,' says she, reflecting 'but 'tis not safe, I'm 
thinkin', to ride down them slantin' things into the 
water.' 

"'How did ye fancy the shoot the chutes?' I asks. 

"'True, then, I'm afraid of guns,' says Norah. 
'They make such noise in my ears. But Uncle Tim, 
he shot them, he did, and won cigars. 'Tis a fine time 
we had this day, Mr. Carnahan.' 

"'I'm glad you've enjoyed yerself,' I says. 'I 
suppose you've had a roarin' fine time seein' the sights. 
And how did the incubators and the helter-skelter 
and the midgets suit the taste of ye?' 

" 'I I wasn't hungry,' says Norah, faint. 'But 
mother ate a quantity of all of 'em. I'm that pleased 
with the fine things in the new Coney Island,' says 
she, 'that it's the happiest day I've seen in a long time, 
at all.' 

"'Did you see Venice?' says I. 

"We did,' says she. 'She was a beauty. She was 
all dressed in red, she was, with 

"I listened no more to Norah Flynn. I stepped 
up and I gathered her in my arms. 

""Tis a story-teller ye are, Norah Flynn', says I. 
'Ye've seen no more of the greater Coney Island than 
I have meself . Come, now, tell the truth ye came 
to sit by the old pavilion by the waves where you sat 



226 Sixes and Sevens 

last summer and made Dennis Carnahan a happy man. 
Speak up, and tell the truth.' 

"Norah stuck her nose against me vest. 

" 'I despise it, Denny,' she says, hah* cryin'. 'Mother 
and Uncle Tim went to see the shows, but I came down 
here to think of you. I couldn't bear the lights and the 
crowd. Are you forgivin' me, Denny, for the words 
we had?' 

" ' 'Twas me fault,' says I. 'I came here for the 
same reason meself. Look at the lights, Norah,' I 
says, turning my back to the sea 'ain't they pretty?' 

"'They are,' says Norah, with her eyes shinin'; 
'and do ye hear the bands play in'? Oh, Denny, I 
think I'd like to see it all.' 

"'The old Coney is gone, darlin',' I says to her. 
'Everything moves. When a man's glad it's not 
scenes of sadness he wants. 'Tis a greater Coney 
we have here, but we couldn't see it till we got in the 
humour for it. Next Sunday, Norah darlin', we'll 
see the new place from end to end." 



XXI 

LAW AND ORDER 

I FOUND myself in Texas recently, revisiting old 
places and vistas. At a sheep ranch where I had so- 
journed many years ago, I stopped for a week. And, 
as all visitors do, I heartily plunged into the business 
at hand, which happened to be that of dipping the 
sheep. 

Now, this process is so different from ordinary 
human baptism that it deserves a word of itself. A 
vast iron cauldron with half the fires of Avernus be- 
neath it is partly filled with water that soon boils 
furiously. Into that is cast concentrated lye, lime, 
and sulphur, which is allowed to stew and fume until 
the witches' broth is strong enough to scorch the third 
arm of Palladino herself. 

Then this concentrated brew is mixed in a long, 
deep vat with cubic gallons of hot water, and the sheep 
are caught by their hind legs and flung into the com- 
pound. After being thoroughly ducked by means 
of a forked pole in the hands of a gentleman detailed 
for that purpose, they are allowed to clamber up an 
incline into a corral and dry or die, as the state of their 

227 



228 Sixes and Sevens 

constitutions may decree. If you ever caught an able- 
bodied, two-year-old mutton by the hind legs and felt 
the 750 volts of kicking that he can send through 
your arm seventeen times before you can hurl him 
into the vat, you will, of course, hope that he may die 
instead of dry. 

But this is merely to explain why Bud Oakley and 
I gladly stretched ourselves on the bank of the nearby 
charco after the dipping, glad for the welcome inanition 
and pure contact with the earth after our muscle- 
racking labours. The flock was a small one, and we 
finished at three in the afternoon; so Bud brought 
from the morral on his saddle horn, coffee and a coffee- 
pot and a big hunk of bread and some side bacon. 
Mr. Mills, the ranch owner and my old friend, rode 
away to the ranch with his force of Mexican traba- 
jadores. 

While the bacon was frizzling nicely, there was the 
sound of horses' hoofs behind us. Bud's six-shooter 
lay in its scabbard ten feet away from his hand. 
He paid not the slightest heed to the approaching 
horseman. This attitude of a Texas ranchman was so 
different from the old-time custom that I marvelled. 
Instinctively I turned to inspect the possible foe that 
menaced us in the rear. I saw a horseman dressed 
in black, who might have been a lawyer or a parson or 
an undertaker, trotting peaceably along the road by 
the arroyo. 



Law and Order 

Bud noticed my precautionary movement and smiled 
sarcastically and sorrowfully. 

"You've been away too long," said he. "You 
don't need to look around any more when anybody 
gallops up behind you in this state, unless something 
hits you in the back; and even then it's liable to be only 
a bunch of tracts or a petition to sign against the trusts. 
I never looked at that hombre that rode by; but I'll 
bet a quart of sheep dip that he's some double-dyed 
son of a popgun out rounding up prohibition votes. " 

"Times have changed, Bud," said I, oracularly. 
"Law and order is the rule now in the South and the 
Southwest. " 

I caught a cold gleam from Bud's pale blue eyes. 

"Not that I - - " I began, hastily. 

"Of course you don't," said Bud warmly. "You 
know better. You've lived here before. Law and 
order, you say? Twenty years ago we had 'em here. 
We only had two or three laws, such as against murder 
before witnesses, and being caught stealing horses, 
and voting the Republican ticket. But how is it now? 
All we get is orders; and the laws go out of the state. 
Them legislators set up there at Austin and don't 
do nothing but make laws against kerosene oil and 
schoolbooks being brought into the state. I reckon 
they was afraid some man would go home some even- 
ing after work and light up and get an education and 
go to work and make laws to repeal aforesaid laws. 



230 Sixes and Sevens 

Me, I'm for the old days when law and order meant 
what they said. A law was a law, and a order was a 
order." 

"But- -"I began. 

"I was going on," continued Bud, "while this coffee 
is boiling, to describe to you a case of genuine law and 
order that I knew of once in the times when cases was 
decided in the chambers of a six-shooter instead of a 
supreme court. 

"You've heard of old Ben Kirkman, the cattle 
king? His ranch run from the Nueces to the Rio 
Grande. In them days, as you know, there was cattle 
barons and cattle kings. The difference was this: 
when a cattleman went to San Antone and bought 
beer for the newspaper reporters and only give them 
the number of cattle he actually owned, they wrote 
him up for a baron. When he bought 'em champagne 
wine and added in the amount of cattle he had stole, 
they called him a king. 

"Luke Summers was one of his range bosses. And 
down to the king's ranch comes one day a bunch of 
these Oriental people from New York or Kansas City 
or thereabouts. Luke was detailed with a squad to 
ride about with 'em, and see that the rattlesnakes got 
fair warning when they was coming, and drive the 
deer out of their way. Among the bunch was a black- 
eyed girl that wore a number two shoe. That's all 
I noticed about her. But Luke must have seen more, 



Law and Order 231 

for he married her one day before the cahallard started 
back, and went over on Canada Verde and set up a 
ranch of his own. I'm skipping over the sentimental 
stuff on purpose, because I never saw or wanted to see 
any of it. And Luke takes me along with him because 
we was old friends and I handled cattle to suit him. 

"I'm skipping over much what followed, because 
I never saw or wanted to see any of it but three 
years afterward there was a boy kid stumbling and 
blubbering around the galleries and floors of Luke's 
ranch. I never had no use for kids; but it seems they 
did. And I'm skipping over much what followed until 
one day out to the ranch drives in hacks and buck- 
boards a lot of Mrs. Summers's friends from the East 
a sister or so and two or three men. One looked 
like an uncle to somebody; and one looked like noth- 
ing; and the other one had on corkscrew pants and 
spoke in a tone of voice. I never liked a man who 
spoke in a tone of voice. 

"I'm skipping over much what followed; but one 
afternoon when I rides up to the ranch house to get 
some orders about a drove of beeves that was to be 
shipped, I hears something like a popgun go off. I 
waits at the hitching rack, not wishing to intrude on 
private affairs. In a little while Luke comes out and 
gives some orders to some of his Mexican hands, and 
they go and hitch up sundry and divers vehicles; and 
mighty soon out comes one of the sisters or so and some 



232 Sixes and Sevens 

of the two or three men. But two of the two or three 
men carries between 'em the corkscrew man who spoke 
in a tone of voice, and lays him flat down in one of the 
wagons. And they all might have been seen wending 
their way away. 

"Bud,' says Luke to me, 'I want you to fix up 
a little and go up to San Antone with me.' 

"'Let me get on my Mexican spurs,' says I, 'and 
I'm your company.' 

"One of the sisters or so seems to have stayed at 
the ranch with Mrs. Summers and the kid. We 
rides to Encinal and catches the International, and 
hits San Antone in the morning. After breakfast 
Luke steers me straight to the office of a lawyer. They 
go in a room and talk and then come out. 

"'Oh, there won't be any trouble, Mr. Summers,' 
says the lawyer. 'I'll acquaint Judge Simmons with 
the facts to-day; and the matter will be put through 
as promptly as possible. Law and order reigns in 
this state as swift and sure as any in the country.' 

"'I'll wait for the decree if it won't take over half 
an hour,' says Luke. 

"Tut, tut,' says the lawyer man. 'Law must take 
its course. Come back day after to-morrow at half- 
past nine.' 

"At that time me and Luke shows up, and the law- 
yer hands him a folded document. And Luke writes 
him out a check. 



Law and Order 233 

"On the sidewalk Luke holds up the paper to me 
and puts a finger the size of a kitchen door latch on it 
and says: 

"'Decree of ab-so-lute divorce with cus-to-dy of 
the child.' 

" 'Skipping over much what has happened of which 
I know nothing,' says I, 'it looks to me like a split. 
Couldn't the lawyer man have made it a strike for 
you?' 

"'Bud,' says he, in a pained style, 'that child is the 
one thing I have to live for. She may go; but the boy 
is mine! think of it I have cus-to-dy of the child.' 

"'All right,' says I. 'If it's the law, let's abide by 
it. But I think,' says I, 'that Judge Simmons might 
have used exemplary clemency, or whatever is the 
legal term, in our case.' 

"You see, I wasn't inveigled much into the desir- 
ableness of having infants around a ranch, except the 
kind that feed themselves and sell for so much on the 
hoof when they grow up. But Luke was struck with 
that sort of parental foolishness that I never could un- 
derstand. All the way riding from the station back 
to the ranch, he kept pulling that decree out of his 
pocket and laying his finger on the back of it and read- 
ing off to me the sum and substance of it. 'Cus-to-dy 
of the child, Bud,' says he. 'Don't forget it cus- 
to-dy of the child.' 

"But when we hits the ranch we finds our decree 



234 Sixes and Sevens 

of court obviated, nolle pressed, and remanded for 
trial. Mrs. Summers and the kid was gone. They 
tell us that an hour after me and Luke had started for 
San Antone she had a team hitched and lit out for the 
nearest station with her trunks and the youngster. 

"Luke takes out his decree once more and reads 
off its emoluments. 

"'It ain't possible, Bud,' says he, 'for this to be. 
It's contrary to law and order. It's wrote as plain 
as day here "Cus-to-dy of the child." 

"'There is what you might call a human leaning,' 
says I, 'toward smashing 'em both not to mention 
the child.' 

"'Judge Simmons,' goes on Luke, 'is a incorporated 
officer of the law. She can't take the boy away. He 
belongs to me by statutes passed and approved by 
the state of Texas.' 

"'And he's removed from the jurisdiction of mun- 
dane mandamuses,' says I, *by the unearthly statutes 
of female partiality. Let us praise the Lord and be 
thankful for whatever small mercies ' I begins; 
but I see Luke don't listen to me. Tired as he was, he 
calls for a fresh horse and starts back again for the 
station. 

"He come back two weeks afterward, not saying 
much. 

"'We can't get the trail,' says he; 'but we've done 
all the telegraphing that the wires'll stand, and we've 



Law and Order 235 

got these city rangers they call detectives on the 
lookout. In the meantime, Bud,' says he, 'we'll 
round up them cows on Brush Creek, and wait for the 
law to take its course.' ' 

And after that we never alluded to allusions, as you 
might say. 

"Skipping over much what happened in the next 
twelve years, Luke was made sheriff of Mojada County. 
He made me his office deputy. Now, don't get in 
your mind no wrong apparitions of a office deputy 
doing sums in a book or mashing letters in a cider 
press. In them days his job was to watch the back 
windows so nobody didn't plug the sheriff in the rear 
while he was adding up mileage at his desk in front. 
And in them days I had qualifications for the job. 
And there was law and order in Mojada County, and 
schoolbooks, and all the whiskey you wanted, and the 
Government built its own battleships instead of col- 
lecting nickels from the school children to do it with. 
And, as I say, there was law and order instead of enact- 
ments and restrictions such as disfigure our umpire 
state to-day. We had our office at Bildad, the county 
seat, from which we emerged forth on necessary oc- 
casions to soothe whatever fracases and unrest that 
might occur in our jurisdiction. 

"Skipping over much what happened while me and 
Luke was sheriff, I waiit to give you an idea of how the 
law was respected in them days. Luke was what 



236 Sixes and Sevens 

you would call one of the most conscious men in the 
world. He never knew much book law, but he had the 
inner emoluments of justice and mercy inculcated into 
his system. If a respectable citizen shot a Mexican 
or held up a train and cleaned out the safe in the ex- 
press car, and Luke ever got hold of him, he'd give the 
guilty party such a reprimand and a cussin' out that 
he'd probable never do it again. But once let some- 
body steal a horse (unless it was a Spanish pony), 
or cut a wire fence, or otherwise impair the peace and 
indignity of Mojada County, Luke and me would 
be on 'em with habeas corpuses and smokeless 
powder and all the modern inventions of equity and 
etiquette. 

"We certainly had our county on a basis of lawful- 
ness. I've known persons of Eastern classification 
with little spotted caps and buttoned-up shoes to get 
off the train at Bildad and eat sandwiches at the 
railroad station without being shot at or even roped 
and drug about by the citizens of the town. 

"Luke had his own ideas of legality and justice. He 
was kind of training me to succeed him when he went 
out of office. He was always looking ahead to the time 
when he'd quit sheriffing. What he wanted to do was 
to build a yellow house with lattice-work under the 
porch and have hens scratching in the yard. The 
one main thing in his mind seemed to be the yard. 

"'Bud,' he says to me, 'by instinct and sentiment 



Law and Order 237 

I'm a contractor. I want to be a contractor. That's 
what I'll be when I get out of office.' 

"'What kind of a contractor?' says I. 'It sounds 
like a kind of a business to me. You ain't going to 
haul cement or establish branches or work on a rail- 
road, are you?' 

"You don't understand,' says Luke. 'I'm tired of 
space and horizons and territory and distances and 
things like that. What I want is reasonable con- 
traction. I want a yard with a fence around it that 
you can go out and set on after supper and listen to 
whip-poor-wills,' says Luke. 

"That's the kind of a man he was. He was home-like,, 
although he'd had bad luck in such investments. But 
he never talked about them times on the ranch. It 
seemed like he'd forgotten about it. I wondered how, 
with his ideas of yards and chickens and notions of 
lattice-work, he'd seemed to have got out of his mind 
that kid of his that had been taken away from him, 
unlawful, in spite of his decree of court. But he wasn't 
a man you could ask about such things as he didn't 
refer to in his own conversation. 

" I reckon he'd put all his emotions and ideas into be- 
ing sheriff. I've read in books about men that was 
disappointed in these poetic and fine-haired and high- 
collared affairs with ladies renouncing truck of that 
kind and wrapping themselves up into some occupation 
like painting pictures, or herding sheep, or science, 



238 Sixes and Sevens 

or teaching school something to make 'em forget. 
Well, I guess that was the way with Luke. But, 
as he couldn't paint pictures, he took it out in round- 
ing up horse thieves and in making Mojada County 
a safe place to sleep in if you was well armed and not 
afraid of requisitions or tarantulas. 

"One day there passes through Bildad a bunch of 
these money investors from the East, and they stopped 
off there, Bildad being the dinner station on the I. & 
G. N. They was just coming back from Mexico look- 
ing after mines and such. There was five of 'ena 
four solid parties, with gold watch chains, that would 
grade up over two hundred pounds on the hoof, and 
one kid about seventeen or eighteen. 

"This youngster had on one of them cowboy suits 
such as tenderfoots bring West with 'em; and you 
could see he was aching to wing a couple of Indians 
or bag a grizzly or two with the little pearl-handled 
gun he had buckled around his waist. 

"I walked down to the depot to keep an eye on the 
outfit and see that they didn't locate any land or 
scare the cow ponies hitched in front of Murchison's 
store or act otherwise unseemly. Luke was away 
after a gang of cattle thieves down on the Frio, and I 
always looked after the law and order when he wasn't 
there. 

"After dinner this boy comes out of the dining-room 
while the train was waiting, and prances up and down 



Law and Order 239 

tke platform ready to shoot all antelope, lions, or 
private citizens that might endeavour to molest 
or come too near him. He was a good-looking kid; 
only he was like all them tenderfoots he didn't 
know a law-and-order town when he saw it. 

"By and by along comes Pedro Johnson, the pro- 
prietor of the Crystal Palace chili-con-carne stand in 
Bildad. Pedro was a man who liked to amuse him- 
self; so he kind of herd rides this youngster, laughing 
at him, tickled to death. I was too far away to hear, 
but the kid seems to mention some remarks to Pedro, 
and Pedro goes up and slaps him about nine feet 
away, and laughs harder than ever. And then the 
boy gets up quicker than he fell and jerks out his little 
pearl-handle, and bing! bing! bingL Pedro gets 
it three times in special and treasured portions of his 
carcass. I saw the dust fly off his clothes every time 
the bullets hit. Sometimes them little thirty-twos 
cause worry at close range. 

"The engine bell was ringing, and the train starting 
off slow. I goes up to the kid and places him under 
arrest, and takes away his gun. But the first thing 
I knew that caballard of capitalists makes a break for 
the train. One of 'em hesitates in front of me for a 
second, and kind of smiles and shoves his hand up 
against my chin, and I sort of laid down on the plat- 
form and took a nap. I never was afraid of guns; 
but I don't want any person except a barber to take 



40 Sixes and Sevens 

liberties like that with my face again. When I woke 
up, the whole outfit train, boy, and all was gone. 
I asked about Pedro, and they told me the doctor said 
he would recover provided his wounds didn't turn 
out to be fatal. 

"When Luke got back three days later, and I told 
him about it, he was mad all over. 

"'Why'n't you telegraph to San Antone,' he aaks, 
'and have the bunch arrested there?' 

"'Oh, well,' says I, 'I always did admire telegraphy; 
but astronomy was what I had took up just then.' 
That capitalist sure knew how to gesticulate with his 
hands. 

"Luke got madder and madder. He investigates 
and finds in the depot a card one of the men had 
dropped that gives the address of some hombre called 
Scudder in New York City. 

"'Bud,' says Luke, 'I'm going after that bunch. 
I'm going there and get the man or boy, as you say 
he was, and bring him back. I'm sheriff of Mojada 
County, and I shall keep law and order in its precincts 
while I'm able to draw a gun. And I want you to go 
with me. No Eastern Yankee can shoot up a respect- 
able and well-known citizen of Bildad, 'specially 
with a thirty-two calibre, and escape the law. Pedro 
Johnson,' says Luke, 'is one of our most prominent 
citizens and business men. I'll appoint Sam BelJ 
acting sheriff with penitentiary powers while Fm 



Law and Order 241 

* 

away, and you and me will take the six forty-five 
northbound to-morrow evening and follow up this 
trail/ 

"'I'm your company,' says I. 'I never see this 
New York, but I'd like to. But, Luke,' says I, 'don't 
you have to have a dispensation or a habeas corpus or 
something from the state, when you reach out that 
far for rich men and malefactors?' 

" 'Did I have a requisition,' says Luke, 'when I went 
over into the Brazos bottoms and brought back Bill 
Grimes and two more for holding up the International? 
Did me and you have a search warrant or a posse 
comitatus when we rounded up them six Mexican cow 
thieves down in Hidalgo? It's my business to keep 
order in Mojada County.' 

" 'And it's my business as office deputy/ says I, 'to 
see that business is carried on according to law. 
Between us both we ought to keep things pretty well 
cleaned up/ 

"So, the next day, Luke packs a blanket and some 
collars and his mileage book in a haversack, and him 
and me hits the breeze for New York. It was a power- 
ful long ride. The seats in the cars was too short for 
six-footers like us to sleep comfortable on; and the con- 
ductor had to keep us from getting off at every town 
that had five-story houses in it. But we got there 
finally; and we seemed to see right away that he was 
right about it. 



242 Sixes and Sevens 

"'Luke,' says I, 'as office deputy and from a law 
standpoint, it don't look to me like this place is properly 
and legally in the jurisdiction of Mojada County, 
Texas.' 

'"From the standpoint of order,' says he, 'it's 
amenable to answer for its sins to the properly ap- 
pointed authorities from Hilclad to Jerusalem.' 

"'Amen,' says I. 'But let's turn our trick sudden, 
and ride. I don't like the looks of this place.' 

"Think of Pedro Johnson,' says Luke, 'a friend of 
mine and yours shot down by one of these gilded 
abolitionists at his very door!' 

"'It was at the door of the freight depot,' says I. 
'But the law will not be balked at a quibble like that.' 

"We put up at one of them big hotels on Broadway. 
The next morning I goes down about two miles of 
stairsteps to the bottom and hunts for Luke. It 
ain't no use. It looks like San Jacinto day in San 
Antone. There's a thousand folks milling around in 
a kind of a roofed-over plaza with marble pavements 
and trees growing right out of 'em, and I see no more 
chance of finding Luke than if we was hunting each 
other in the big pear flat down below Old Fort Ewell. 
But soon Luke and me runs together in one of the turns 
of them marble alleys. 

"'It ain't no use, Bud,' says he. 'I can't find no 
place to eat at. I've been looking for restaurant 
signs and smelling for ham all over the camp. But 



Law and Order 243 

I'm used to going hungry when I have to. Now,' 
says he, 'I'm going out and get a hack and ride down 
to the address on this Scudder card. You stay here 
and try to hustle some grub. But I doubt if you'll 
find it. I wish we'd brought along some cornmeal 
and bacon and beans. I'll be back when I see this 
Scudder, if the trail ain't wiped out.' 

"So I starts foraging for breakfast. For the honour 
of old Mojada County I didn't want to seem green 
to them abolitionists, so every time I turned a corner 
in them marble halls I went up to the first desk or 
counter I see and looks around for grub. If I didn't 
see what I wanted I asked for something else. In 
about half an hour I had a dozen cigars, five story 
magazines, and seven or eight railroad time-tables in 
my pockets, and never a smell of coffee or bacon to 
point out the trail. 

"Once a lady sitting at a table and playing a game 
kind of like pushpin told me to go into a closet that 
she called Number 3. I went in and shut the door, 
and the blamed thing lit itself up. I set down on a 
stool before a shelf and waited. Thinks I, 'This is 
a private dining-room.' But no waiter never came. 
When I got to sweating good and hard, I goes out 
again. 

" 'Did you get what you wanted?' says she. 

"'No, ma'am,' says I. 'Not a bite.' 

"Then there's no charge,' says she. 



244 Sixes and Sevens 

"Thanky, ma'am,' says I, and I takes up the trail 
again. 

"By and by I thinks I'll shed etiquette; and I picks 
up one of them boys with blue clothes and yellow 
buttons in front, and he leads me to what he calls the 
caffay breakfast room. And the first thing I lays 
my eyes on when I go in is that boy that had shot 
Pedro Johnson. He was setting all alone at a little 
table, hitting a egg with a spoon like he was afraid he'd 
break it. 

"I takes the chair across the table from him; and 
he looks insulted and makes a move like he was going 
to get up. 

"'Keep still, son,' says I. 'You're apprehended, 
arrested, and in charge of the Texas authorities. Go 
on and hammer that egg some more if it's the inside 
of it you want. Now, what did you shoot Mr. John- 
son, of Bildad, for? ' 

" 'And may I ask who you are?' says he. 

" ' You may,' says I. *Go ahead.' 

"'I suppose you're on,' says this kid, without 
batting his eyes. 'But what are you eating? Here, 
waiter!' he calls out, raising his finger. 'Take this 
gentleman's order.' 

"'A beefsteak,' says I, 'and some fried eggs and a 
can of peaches and a quart of coffee will about suffice.' 

" We talk awhile about the sundries of life and then 
he says: 



Law and Order 245 

" 'What are you going to do about that shooting? I 
had a right to shoot that man,' says he. 'He called 
me names that I couldn't overlook, and then he struck 
me. He carried a gun, too. What else could I do?' 

"'We'll have to take you back to Texas,' says I. 

" 'I'd like to go back,' says the boy, with a kind of a 
grin 'if it wasn't on an occasion of this kind. It's 
the life I like. I've always wanted to ride and shoot 
and live in the open air ever since I can remember.' 

" 'Who was this gang of stout parties you took this 
trip with?' I asks. 

"'My stepfather,' says he, 'and some business part- 
ners of his in some Mexican mining and land schemes.' 

"'I saw you shoot Pedro Johnson,' says I, 'and I 
took that little popgun away from you that you did 
it with. And when I did so I noticed three or four 
little scars in a row over your right eyebrow. You've 
been in rookus before, haven't you?' 

"'I've had these scars ever since I can remember/ 
says he. 'I don't know how they came there.' 
"Was you ever in Texas before?' says I. 

" 'Not that I remember of,' says he. 'But I thought 
I had when we struck the prairie country. But I 
guess I hadn't.' 

" 'Have you got a mother?' I asks. 

" 'She died five years ago,' says he. 

" Skipping over the most of what followed wheat 
Luke came back I turned the kid over to him. He 



46 Sixes and Sevens 

had seen Scudder and told him what he wanted; 
and it seems that Scudder got active with one of these 
telephones as soon as he left. For in about an hour 
afterward there comes to our hotel some of these 
city rangers in everyday clothes that they call detec- 
tives, and marches the whole outfit of us to what they 
call a magistrate's court. They accuse Luke of at- 
tempted kidnapping, and ask him what he has to say. 
"This snipe,' says Luke to the judge, 'shot and 
wilfully punctured with malice and forethought one 
of the most respected and prominent citizens of the 
town of Bildad, Texas, Your Honor. And in so doing 
laid himself liable to the penitence of law and order. 
And I hereby make claim and demand restitution of 
the State of New York City for the said alleged crimi- 
nal; and I know he done it.' 

'"Have you the usual and necessary requisition 
papers from the governor of your state?' asks the 
judge. 

"'My usual papers,' says Luke, 'was taken away 
from me at the hotel by these gentlemen who represent 
law and order in your city. They was two Colt's 
.45 's that I've packed for nine years; and if I 
don't get 'em back, there'll be more trouble. You can 
ask anybody in Mojada County about Luke Sum- 
mers. I don't usually need any other kind of papers 
for what I do.' 

"I see the judge looks mad, so I steps up and says: 



Law and Order 247 

"'Your Honor, the aforesaid defendant, Mr. Luke 
Summers, sheriff of Mojada County, Texas, is as 
fine a man as ever threw a rope or upheld the statutes 
and codicils of the greatest state in the Union. But 
he ' 

"The judge hits his table with a wooden hammer and 
asks who I am. 

** 'Bud Oakley,' says I. 'Office deputy of the sheriff's 
office of Mojada County, Texas. Representing,' says 
I, 'the Law. Luke Summers,' I goes on, 'represents 
Order. And if Your Honor will give me about ten 
minutes in private talk, I'll explain the whole tiling 
to you, and show you the equitable and legal requisi- 
tion papers which I carry in my pocket.' 

"The judge kind of half smiles and says he will 
talk with me in his private room. In there I put the 
whole thing up to him in such language as I had, and 
when we goes outside, he announces the verdict that 
the young man is delivered into the hands of the 
Texas authorities; and calls the next case. 

" Skipping over much of what happened on the way 
back, I'll tell you how the thing wound up in Bildad. 

"When we got the prisoner in the sheriff's office, I 
says to Luke : 

' 'You remember that kid of yours that two-year 
old that they stole away from you when the bust-up 
come?' 

"Luke looks black and angry. He'd never let any- 



248 Sixes and Sevens 

body talk to him about that business, and he never 
mentioned it himself. 

"Toe the mark,' says I. 'Do you remember when 
he was toddling around on the porch and fell down on 
a pair of Mexican spurs and cut four little holes over 
his right eye? Look at the prisoner,' says I, 'look at 
his nose and the shape of his head and why, you old 
fool, don't you know your own son? I knew him,' 
says I, 'when he perforated Mr. Johnson at the 
depot.' 

"Luke comes over to me shaking all over. I never 
sew him lose his nerve before. 

"'Bud,' says he, 'I've never had that boy out of my 
mind one day or one night since he was took away. 
But I never let on. But can we hold him? Can we 
make him stay ? I'll make the best man of him that 
ever put his foot in a stirrup. Wait a minute,' says 
he, all excited and out of his mind 'I've got some- 
thing here in my desk I reckon it'll hold legal yet 
I've looked at it a thousand times " Cus-to-dy of 
the child," says Luke "Cus-to-dy of the child. " We 
can hold him on that, can't we? Le'me see if I can 
find that decree.' 

"Luke begins to tear his desk to pieces. 

'"Hold on,' says I. 'You are Order and I'm 
Law. You needn't look for that paper, Luke. It 
ain't a decree any more. It's requisition papers. It's 
on file in that Magistrate's office in New York. I took 



Law and Order 249 

it along when we went, because I was office deputy 
and knew the law.' 

"'I've got him back,' says Luke. 'He's mine again. 
I never thought 

"'Wait a minute,' says I. 'We've got to have law 
and order. You and me have got to preserve 'em 
both in Mojada County according to our oath and 
conscience. The kid shot Pedro Johnson, one of 
Bildad's most prominent and 

'"Oh, hell!' says Luke. 'That don't amount to 
anything. That fellow was half Mexican, anyhow."* 



xxn 

TRANSFORMATION OF MARTIN BURNEY 

IN BEHALF of Sir Walter's soothing plant let iw 
look into the case of Martin Burney. 

They were constructing the Speedway along the 
west bank of the Harlem River. The grub-boat of 
Dennis Corrigan, sub-contractor, was moored to a tree 
on the bank. Twenty-two men belonging to the 
little green island toiled there at the sinew-cracking 
labour. One among them, who wrought in the kitchen 
of the grub-boat was of the race of the Goths. Orer 
them all stood the exorbitant Corrigan, harrying them 
like the captain of a galley crew. He paid them so 
little that most of the gang, work as they might, earned 
little more than food and tobacco; many of them were 
im debt to him. Corrigan boarded them all in the 
grub-boat, and gave them good grub, for he got it 
back in work. 

Martin Burney was furthest behind of all. He was 
a little man, all muscles and hands and feet, with a 
gray-red, stubbly beard. He was too light for the 
work, which would have glutted the capacity of a 
shovel. 

250 



Transformation of Martin Burney 251 

The work was hard. Besides that, the banks of the 
river were humming with mosquitoes. As a child in 
a dark room fixes his regard on the pale light of a com- 
forting window, these toilers watched the sun that 
brought around the one hour of the day that tasted 
less bitter. After the sundown supper they would 
huddle together on the river bank, and send the mos- 
quitoes whining and eddying back from the malignant 
puffs of twenty-three reeking pipes. Thus socially 
banded against the foe, they wrenched out of the hour 
a few well-smoked drops from the cup of joy. 

Each week Burney grew deeper in debt. Corrigan 
kept a small stock of goods on the boat, which he sold 
to the men at prices that brought him no loss. Burney 
was a good customer at the tobacco counter. One 
sack when he went to work in the morning and one 
when he came in at night, so much was his account 
swelled daily. Burney was something of a smoker. 
Yet it was not true that he ate his meals with a pipe 
in his mouth, which had been said of him. The little 
man was not discontented. He had plenty to eat, 
plenty of tobacco, and a tyrant to curse; so why should 
not he, an Irishman, be well satisfied? 

One morning as he was starting with the others for 
work he stopped at the pine counter for his usual sack 
of tobacco. 

"There's no more for ye," said Corrigan. "Your 
account's closed. Ye are a losing investment. No, 



252 Sixes and Sevens 

not even tobaccy, my son. No more tobaccy on 
account. If ye want to work on and eat, do so, but 
the smoke of ye has all ascended. 'Tis my advice 
that ye hunt a new job." 

"I have no tobaccy to smoke in my pipe this day, 
Mr. Corrigan," said Burney, not quite understanding 
that such a thing could happen to him. 

"Earn it," said Corrigan, "and then buy it." 

Burney stayed on. He knew of no other job. At 
first he did not realize that tobacco had got to be his 
father and mother, his confessor and sweetheart, and 
wife and child. 

For three days he managed to fill his pipe from the 
other men's sacks, and then they shut him off, one and 
all. They told him, rough but friendly, that of all 
things in the world tobacco must be quickest forth- 
coming to a fellow-man desiring it, but that beyond 
the immediate temporary need requisition upon the 
store of a comrade is pressed with great danger to 
friendship. 

Then the blackness of the pit arose and filled the 
heart of Burney. Sucking the corpse of his deceased 
dudheen^ he staggered through his duties with his 
barrowful of stones and dirt, feeling for the first time 
that the curse of Adam was upon him. Other men 
bereft of a pleasure might have recourse to other 
delights, but Burney had only two comforts in life. 
One was his pipe, the other was an ecstatic hope that 



Transformation of Martin Burney 253 

there would be no Speedways to build on the other side 
of Jordan. 

At meal times he would let the other men go first 
into the grub-boat, and then he would go down on his 
hands and knees, grovelling fiercely upon the ground 
where they had been sitting, trying to find some stray 
crumbs of tobacco. Once he sneaked down the river 
bank and filled his pipe with dead willow leaves. At 
the first whiff of the smoke he spat in the direction of 
the boat and put the finest curse he knew on Corrigan 
one that began with the first Corrigans born on 
earth and ended with the Corrigans that shall hear the 
trumpet of Gabriel blow. He began to hate Corrigan 
with all his shaking nerves and soul. Even murder 
occurred to him in a vague sort of way. Five days he 
went without the taste of tobacco he who had 
smoked all day and thought the night misspent in 
which he had not awakened for a pipeful or two under 
the bedclothes. 

One day a man stopped at the boat to say that there 
was work to be had in the Bronx Park, where a large 
number of labourers were required in making some 
improvements. 

After dinner Burney walked thirty yards down the 
river bank away from the maddening smell of the 
others' pipes. He sat down upon a stone. He was 
thinking he would set out for the Bronx. At least he 
could earn tobacco there. What if the books did say 



254 Sixes and Sevens 

he owed Corrigan? Any man's work was worth his 
keep. But then he hated to go without getting even 
with the hard-hearted screw who had put his pipe out. 
Was there any way to do it? 

Softly stepping among the clods came Tony, he of 
the race of Goths, who worked in the kitchen. He 
grinned at Burney's elbow, and that unhappy man, 
full of race animosity and holding urbanity in con- 
tempt, growled at him: "What d'ye want, ye 

Dago?" 

Tony also contained a grievance and a plot. 
He, too, was a Corrigan hater, and had been primed to 
see it in others. 

"How you like-a Mr. Corrigan?" he asked. "You 
think-a him a nice-a man?" 

"To hell with *m," he said. "May his liver turn 
to water, and the bones of him crack in the cold of his 
heart. May dog fennel grow upon his ancestors' 
graves, and the grandsons of his children be born 
without eyes. May whiskey turn to clabber in his 
mouth, and every time he sneezes may he blister the 
soles of his feet. And the smoke of his pipe may it 
make his eyes water, and the drops fall on the grass 
that his cows eat and poison the butter that he 
spreads on his bread." 

Though Tony remained a stranger to the beauties 
of this imagery, he gathered from it the conviction 
that it was sufficiently anti-Corrigan in its tendency. 



Transformation of Martin Burney 255 

So, with the confidence of a fellow-conspirator, he 
sat by Burney upon the stone and unfolded his plot. 

It was very simple in design. Every day after 
dinner it was Corrigan's habit to sleep for an hour in 
his bunk. At such times it was the duty of the cook 
and his helper, Tony, to leave the boat so that no noise 
might disturb the autocrat. The cook always spent 
this hour in walking exercise. Tony's plan was this: 
After Corrigan should be asleep he (Tony) and Burney 
would cut the mooring ropes that held the boat to the 
shore. Tony lacked the nerve to do the deed alone. 
Then the awkward boat would swing out into a swift 
current and surely overturn against a rock there 
was below. 

"Come on and do it," said Burney. "If the back 
of ye aches from the lick he gave ye as the pit of me 
stomach does for the taste of a bit of smoke, we can't 
cut the ropes too quick." 

"All a-right," said Tony. " But better wait 'bout-a 
ten minute more. Give-a Corrigan plenty time get 
good-a sleep." 

They waited, sitting upon the stone. The rest of 
the men were at work out of sight around a bend in the 
road. Everything would have gone well except, 
perhaps, with Corrigan, had not Tony been moved to 
decorate the plot with its conventional accompaniment. 
He was of dramatic blood, and perhaps he intuitively 
divined the appendage to villainous machinations as 



256 Sixes and Sevens 

prescribed by the stage. He pulled from his shirt 
bosom a long, black, beautiful, venomous cigar, and 
handed it to Burney. 

"You like-a smoke while we wait?" he asked. 

Burney clutched it and snapped off the end as a 
terrier bites at a rat. He laid it to his lips like a long- 
lost sweetheart. When the smoke began to draw he 
gave a long, deep sigh, and the bristles of his gray-red 
moustache curled down over the cigar like the talons 
of an eagle. Slowly the red faded from the whites of 
his eyes. He fixed his gaze dreamily upon the hills 
across the river. The minutes came and went. 

" 'Bout time to go now," said Tony. " That damn-a 
Corrigan he be in the reever very quick." 

Burney started out of his trance with a grunt. He 
turned his head and gazed with a surprised and pained 
severity at his accomplice. He took the cigar partly 
from his mouth, but sucked it back again immediately, 
chewed it lovingly once or twice, and spoke, in virulent 
puffs, from the corner of his mouth: 

"What is it, ye yaller haythen? Would ye lay 
contrivances against the enlightened races of the 
earth, ye instigator of illegal crimes? Would ye seek 
to persuade Martin Burney into the dirty tricks of an 
indecent Dago? Would ye be for murderin' your bene- 
factor, the good man that gives ye food and work? 
Take that, ye punkin-coloured assassin!" 

The torrent of Burney's indignation carried with it 



Transformation of Martin Burney 257 

bodily assault. The toe of his shoe sent the would-be 
cutter of ropes tumbling from his seat. 

Tony arose and fled. His vendetta he again rele- 
gated to the files of things that might have been. 
Beyond the boat he fled and away-away; he was afraid 
to remain. 

Burney, with expanded chest, watched his late co- 
plotter disappear. Then he, too, departed, setting his 
face in the direction of the Bronx. 

In his wake was a rank and pernicious trail of 
noisome smoke that brought peace to his heart and 
drove the birds from the roadside into the deepest 
thickets. 






XXIII 
THE CALIPH AND THE CAD 

JbURELY there is no pastime more diverting than that 
of mingling, incognito, with persons of wealth and 
station. Where else but in those circles can one see 
life in its primitive, crude state unhampered by the 
conventions that bind the dwellers in a lower sphere? 

There was a certain Caliph of Bagdad who was 
accustomed to go down among the poor and lowly for 
the solace obtained from the relation of their tales and 
histories. Is it not strange that the humble and 
poverty-stricken have not availed themselves of the 
pleasure they might glean by donning diamonds and 
silks and playing Caliph among the haunts of the 
upper world? 

There was one who saw the possibilities of thus 
turning the tables on Haroun al Raschid. His name 
was Corny Brannigan, and he was a truck driver for a 
Canal Street importing firm. And if you read further 
you will learn how he turned upper Broadway into 
Bagdad and learned something about himself that he 
did not know before. 

Many people would have called Corny a snob 

258 



The Caliph and the Cad 259 

preferably by means of a telephone. His chief interest 
in life, his chosen amusement, and his sole diversion 
after working hours, was to place himself in juxta- 
position since he could not hope to mingle with 
people of fashion and means. 

Every evening after Corny had put up his team and 
dined at a lunch-counter that made immediateness a 
specialty, he would clothe himself in evening raiment 
as correct as any you will see in the palm rooms. Then 
he would betake himself to that ravishing, radiant 
roadway devoted to Thespis, Thais, and Bacchus. 

For a time he would stroll about the lobbies of the 
best hotels, his soul steeped in blissful content. Beau- 
tiful women, cooing like doves, but feathered like birds 
of Paradise, nicked him with their robes as they passed. 
Courtly gentlemen attended them, gallant and assidu- 
ous. And Corny 's heart within him swelled like 
Sir Lancelot's, for the mirror spoke to him as he passed 
and said: "Corny, lad, there's not a guy among 'em 
that looks a bit the sweller than yerself. And you 
drivin' of a truck and them swearin' off their taxes 
and playin' the red in art galleries with the best in 
the land!" 

And the mirrors spake the truth. Mr. Corny 
Brannigan had acquired the outward polish, if nothing 
more. Long and keen observation of polite society 
had gained for him its manner, its genteel air, and 
most difficult of acquirement its repose and ease. 



260 Sixes and Sevens 

Now and then in the hotels Corny had managed 
conversation and temporary acquaintance with sub- 
stantial, if not distinguished, guests. With many of 
these he had exchanged cards, and the ones he received 
he carefully treasured for his own use later. Leaving 
the hotel lobbies, Corny would stroll leisurely about, 
lingering at the theatre entrance, dropping into the 
fashionable restaurants as if seeking some friend. He 
rarely patronized any of these places; he was no bee 
come to suck honey, but a butterfly flashing his wings 
among the flowers whose calyces held no sweets for 
him. His wages were not large enough to furnish him 
with more than the outside garb of the gentleman. 
To have been one of the beings he so cunningly 
imitated, Corny Brannigan would have given his right 
hand. 

One night Corny had an adventure. After absorb- 
ing the delights of an hour's lounging in the principal 
hotels along Broadway, he passed up into the strong- 
hold of Thespis. Cab drivers hailed him as a likely 
fare, to his prideful content. Languishing eyes were 
turned upon him as a hopeful source of lobsters and 
the delectable, ascendant globules of effervescence. 
These overtures and unconscious compliments Corny 
swallowed as manna, and hoped Bill, the off horse, 
would be less lame in the left forefoot in the morning. 

Beneath a cluster of milky globes of electric light 
Corny paused to admire the sheen of his low-cut 



The Caliph and the Cad 261 

patent leather shoes. The building occupying the 
angle was a pretentious cafe. Out of this came a 
couple, a lady in a white, cobwebby evening gown, with 
a lace wrap like a wreath of mist thrown over it, and a 
man, tall, faultless, assured too assured. They 
moved to the edge of the sidewalk and halted. Corny's 
eye, ever alert for "pointers" in "swell" behaviour, 
took them in with a sidelong glance. 

"The carriage is not here," said the lady. "You 
ordered it to wait? " 

"I ordered it for nine-thirty," said the man. "It 
should be here now." 

A familiar note in the lady's voice drew a more 
especial attention from Corny. It was pitched in a 
key well known to him. The soft electric shone upon 
her face. Sisters of sorrow have no quarters fixed 
for them. In the index to the book of breaking hearts 
you will find that Broadway follows very soon after 
the Bowery. This lady's face was sad, and her voice 
was attuned with it They waited, as if for the car- 
riage. Corny waited too, for it was out of doors, and 
he was never tired of accumulating and profiting by 
knowledge of gentlemanly conduct. 

"Jack," said the lady, "don't be angry. I've done 
everything I could to please you this evening. Why 
do you act so?" 

"Oh, you're an angel," said the man. "Depend 
upon woman to throw the blame upon a man." 



262 Sixes and Sevens 

"I'm not blaming you. I'm only trying to make 
you happy." 

"You go about it in a very peculiar way." 

" You have been cross with me all the evening with- 
out any cause." 

"Oh, there isn't any cause except you make 
me tired." 

Corny took out his card case and looked over his 
collection. He selected one that read: "Mr. R. 
Lionel Whyte-Melville, Bloomsbury Square, London." 
This card he had inveigled from a tourist at the King 
Edward Hotel. Corny stepped up to the man and 
presented it with a correctly formal air. 

"May I ask why I am selected for the honour?" 
asked the lady's escort. 

Now, Mr. Corny Brannigan had a very wise habit 
of saying little during his imitations of the Caliph of 
Bagdad. The advice of Lord Chesterfield: "Wear 
a black coat and hold your tongue," he believed in 
without having heard. But now speech was demanded 
and required of him. 

"No gent," said Corny, "would talk to a lady like 
you done. Fie upon you, Willie! Even if she hap- 
pens to be your wife you ought to have more respect 
for your clothes than to chin her back that way. May- 
be it ain't my butt-in, but it goes, anyhow you 
strike me as bein' a whole lot to the wrong." 

The lady's escort indulged in more elegantly ex- 



The Caliph and the Cad 263 

pressed but fetching repartee. Corny, eschewing his 
truck driver's vocabulary, retorted as nearly as he 
could in polite phrases. Then diplomatic relations 
were severed; there was a brief but lively set-to with 
other than oral weapons, from which Corny came 
forth easily victor. 

A carriage dashed up, driven by a tardy and solic- 
itous coachman. 

"Will you kindly open the door for me?" asked the 
lady. Corny assisted her to enter, and took off his 
hat. The escort was beginning to scramble up from 
the sidewalk. 

"I beg your pardon, ma'am," said Corny, "if he's 
your man." 

"He's no man of mine," said the lady. "Perhaps 
he but there's no chance of his being now. Drive 
home, Michael. If you care to take this with 
my thanks." 

Three red roses were thrust out through the carriage 
window into Corny's hand. He took them, and the 
hand for an instant; and then the carriage sped away. 

Corny gathered his foe's hat and began to brush the 
dust from his clothes. 

"Come along," said Corny, taking the other man 
by the arm. 

His late opponent was yet a little dazed by the hard 
knocks he had received. Corny led him carefully into 
a saloon three doors away. 



264 Sixes and Sevens 

"The drinks for us," said Corny "me and my 
friend." 

"You're a queer feller," said the lady's late escort 
"lick a man and then want to set 'em up." 

"You're my best friend," said Corny exultantly. 
"You don't understand? Well, listen. You just put 
me wise to somethin'. I been playin' gent a long time, 
thinkin' it was just the glad rags I had and nothin' 
else. Say you're a swell, ain't you? Well, you 
trot in that class, I guess. I don't; but I found out 
one thing I'm a gentleman, by and I know 
it now. What'll you have to drink? " 



XXIV 
THE DIAMOND OF KALI 

1 HE original news item concerning the diamond of 
the goddess Kali was handed in to the city editor. 
He smiled and held it for a moment above the waste- 
basket. Then he laid it back on his desk and said: 
"Try the Sunday people; they might work something 
out of it." 

The Sunday editor glanced the item over and said: 
"H'm!" Afterward he sent for a reporter and ex- 
panded his comment. 

"You might see General Ludlow," he said, "and 
make a story out of this if you can. Diamond stories 
are a drug; but this one is big enough to be found by a 
scrubwoman wrapped up in a piece of newspaper and 
tucked under the corner of the hall linoleum. Find 
out first if the General has a daughter who intends to go 
on the stage. If not, you can go ahead with the story. 
Run cuts of the Kohinoor and J. P. Morgan's collec- 
tion, and work in pictures of the Kimberley mines and 
Barney Barnato. Fill in with a tabulated comparison 
of the values of diamonds, radium, and veal cutlets 
since the meat strike; and let it run to a half page." 

265 



266 Sixes and Sevens 

On the following day the reporter turned in his 
story. The Sunday editor let his eye sprint along its 
lines. "H'm!" he said again. This time the copy 
went into the waste-basket with scarcely a flutter. 

The reporter stiffened a little around the lips; but 
he was whistling softly and contentedly between his 
teeth when I went over to talk with him about it an 
hour later. 

"I don't blame the 'old man'," said he, magnani- 
mously, "for cutting it out. It did sound like funny 
business; but it happened exactly as I wrote it. Say, 
why don't you fish that story out of the w.-b. and use 
it? Seems to me it's as good as the tommy rot you 
write." 

I accepted the tip, and if you read further you will 
learn the facts about the diamond of the goddess 
Kali as vouched for by one of the most reliable re- 
porters on the staff. 

Gen. Marcellus B. Ludlow lives in one of those 
decaying but venerated old red-brick mansions in 
the West Twenties. The General is a member of an 
old New York family that does not advertise. He is 
a globe-trotter by birth, a gentleman by predilection, 
a millionaire by the mercy of Heaven, and a con- 
noisseur of precious stones by occupation. 

The reporter was admitted promptly when he made 
himself known at the General's residence at about 
eigK*- thirty on the evening that he received the assign- 



The Diamond of Kali 267 

ment. In the magnificent library he was greeted by the 
distinguished traveller and connoisseur, a tall, erect 
gentleman in the early fifties, with a nearly white 
moustache, and a bearing so soldierly that one per- 
ceived in him scarcely a trace of the National Guards- 
man. His weather-beaten countenance lit up with a 
charming smile of interest when the reporter made 
known his errand. 

"Ah, you have heard of my latest find. I shall 
be glad to show you what I conceive to be one of the 
six most valuable blue diamonds in existence." 

The General opened a small safe in a corner of the 
library and brought forth a plush-covered box. 
Opening this, he exposed to the reporter's bewildered 
gaze a huge and brilliant diamond nearly as large 
as a hailstone. 

"This stone," said the General, "is something 
more than a mere jewel. It once formed the central 
eye of the three-eyed goddess Kali, who is worshipped 
by one of the fiercest and most fanatical tribes of 
India. If you will arrange yourself comfortably I 
will give you a brief history of it for your paper." 

General Ludlow brought a decanter of whiskey and 
glasses from a cabinet, and set a comfortable armchair 
for the lucky scribe. 

"The Phansigars, or Thugs, of India," began the 
General, "are the most dangerous and dreaded of the 
tribes of North India. They are extremists in 



268 Sixes and Sevens 

religion, and worship the horrid goddess Kali in the 
form of images. Their rites are interesting and 
bloody. The robbing and murdering of travellers are 
taught as a worthy and obligatory deed by their 
strange religious code. Their worship of the three- 
eyed goddess Kali is conducted so secretly that no 
traveller has ever heretofore had the honour of wit- 
nessing the ceremonies. That distinction was re- 
served for myself. 

"While at Sakaranpur, between Delhi and Khelat, 
I used to explore the jungle in every direction in the 
hope of learning something new about these mys- 
terious Phansigars. 

"One evening at twilight I was making my way 
through a teakwood forest, when I came upon a deep 
circular depression in an open space, in the centre of 
which was a rude stone temple. I was sure that this 
was one of the temples of the Thugs, so I concealed 
myself in the undergrowth to watch. 

"When the moon rose the depression in the clearing 
was suddenly filled with hundreds of shadowy, swiftly 
gliding forms. Then a door opened in the temple, 
exposing a brightly illuminated image of the goddesss 
Kali, before which a white-robed priest began a bar- 
barous incantation, while the tribe of worshippers 
prostrated themselves upon the earth. 

"But what interested me most was the central eye 
of the huge wooden idol. I could see by its flashing 



The Diamond of Kali 269 

brilliancy that it was an immense diamond of the 
purest water. 

"After the rites were concluded the Thugs slipped 
away into the forest as silently as they had come. 
The priest stood for a few minutes in the door of the 
temple enjoying the cool of the night before closing 
his rather warm quarters. Suddenly a dark, lithe 
shadow slipped down into the hollow, leaped upon the 
priest, and struck him down with a glittering knife. 
Then the murderer sprang at the image of the goddess 
like a cat and pried out the glowing central eye of 
Kali with his weapon. Straight toward me he ran 
with his royal prize. When he was within two paces 
I rose to my feet and struck him with all my force 
between the eyes. He rolled over senseless and the 
magnificent jewel fell from his hand. That is the 
splendid blue diamond you have just seen a stone 
worthy of a monarch's crown." 

"That's a corking story," said the reporter. "That 
decanter is exactly like the one that John W. Gates 
alw ys sets out during an interview." 

" ?ardon me," said General Ludlow, "for forgetting 
hos dtality in the excitement of my narrative. 
Hel > yourself." 

' Here's looking at you," said the reporter. 

"What I am afraid of now," said the General, lower- 
ing his voice, "is that I may be robbed of the diamond. 
The jewel that formed an eye of their goddess is their 



270 Sixes and Sevens 

most sacred symbol. Somehow the tribe suspected 
me of having it; and members of the band have followed 
me half around the earth. They are the most cunning 
and cruel fanatics in the world, and their religious vows 
would compel them to assassinate the unbeliever who 
has desecrated their sacred treasure. 

"Once in Lucknow three of their agents, disguised 
as servants in a hotel, endeavoured to strangle me 
with a twisted cloth. Again, in London, two Thugs, 
made up as street musicians, climbed into my window 
at night and attacked me. They have even tracked 
me to this country. My life is never safe. A month 
ago, while I was at a hotel in the Berkshires, three of 
them sprang upon me from the roadside weeds. I 
saved myself then by my knowledge of their customs." 

"How was that, General?" asked the reporter. 

"There was a cow grazing near by," said General 
Ludlow, "a gentle Jersey cow. I ran to her side and 
stood. The three Thugs ceased their attack, knelt 
and struck the ground thrice with their fore- 
heads. Then, after many respectful salaams, they 
departed." 

"Afraid the cow would hook?" asked the reporter. 

"No; the cow is a sacred animal to the Phansigars. 
Next to their goddess they worship the cow. They 
have never been known to commit any deed of violence 
in the presence of the animal they reverence." 

"It's a mighty interesting story," said the reporter. 



The Diamond of Kali 271 

"If you don't mind I'll take another drink, and then 
a few notes." 

"I will join you," said General Ludlow, with a 
courteous wave of his hand. 

"If I were you," advised the reporter, "I'd take 
that sparkler to Texas. Get on a cow ranch there, 
and the Pharisees " 

"Phansigars," corrected the General. 

"Oh, yes; the fancy guys would run up against a 
long horn every time they made a break." 

General Ludlow closed the diamond case and thrust 
it into his bosom. 

"The spies of the tribe have found me out in New 
York," he said, straightening his tall figure. "I'm 
familiar with the East Indian cast of countenance, 
and I know that my every movement is watched. 
They will undoubtedly attempt to rob and murder 
me here." 

"Here?" exclaimed the reporter, seizing the de- 
canter and pouring out a liberal amount of its contents. 

"At any moment," said the General. "But as a 
soldier and a connoisseur I shall sell my life and my 
diamond as dearly as I can." 

At this point of the reporter's story there is a certain 
vagueness, but it can be gathered that there was a 
loud crashing noise at the rear of the house they were 
in. General Ludlow buttoned his coat closely and 
sprang for the door. But the reporter clutched him 



272 Sixes and Sevens 

firmly with one hand, while he held the decanter with 
the other. 

"Tell me before we fly," he urged, in a voice thick 
with some inward turmoil, "do any of your daughters 
contemplate going on the stage? " 

"I have no daughters fly for your life the 
Phansigars are upon us!" cried the General. 

The two men dashed out of the front door of the 
house. 

The hour was late. As their feet struck the side- 
walk strange men of dark and forbidding appearance 
seemed to rise up out of the earth and encompass them. 
One with Asiatic features pressed close to the General 
and droned in a terrible voice: 

"Buy cast clo'!" 

Another, dark-whiskered and sinister, sped lithely 
to his side and began in a whining voice: 

"Say, mister, have yer got a dime fer a poor feller 
what " 

They hurried on, but only into the arms of a black - 
eyed, dusky-browed being, who held out his hat 
under their noses, while a confederate of Oriental hue 
turned the handle of a street organ near by. 

Twenty steps farther on General Ludlow and the 
reporter found themselves in the midst of half a dozen 
villainous-looking men with high-turned coat collars 
and faces bristling with unshaven beards. 

"Run for it!" hissed the General. "They have 



The Diamond of Kali 273 

discovered the possessor of the diamond of the god- 
dess Kali." 

The two men took to their heels. The avengers of 
the goddess pursued. 

"Oh, Lordy!" groaned the reporter, "there isn't 
a cow this side of Brooklyn. We're lost!" 

When near the corner they both fell over an iron 
object that rose from the sidewalk close to the gutter. 
Clinging to it desperately, they awaited their fate. 

"If I only had a cow!" moaned the reporter "or 
another nip from that decanter, General!" 

As soon as the pursuers observed where their victims 
had found refuge they suddenly fell back and retreated 
to a considerable distance. 

"They are waiting for reinforcements in order to 
attack us," said General Ludlow. 

But the reporter emitted a ringing laugh, and hurled 
his hat triumphantly into the air. 

"Guess again," he shouted, and leaned heavily upon 
the iron object. "Your old fancy guys or thugs, 
whatever you call 'em, are up to date. Dear General, 
this is a pump we've stranded upon same as a cow 
in New York (hie!) see? Thas'h why the 'nfuriated 
smoked guys don't attack us see? Sacred an'mal, 
the pump in N' York, my dear General!" 

But further down in the shadows of Twenty -eighth 
Street the marauders were holding a parley. 

"Come on, Reddy," said one. "Let's go frisk the 



274 Sixes and Sevens 

old 'un. He's been showin' a sparkler as big as a hen 
egg all around Eighth Avenue for two weeks past." 

"Not on your silhouette," decided Reddy. "You 
see 'em rallyin' round The Pump? They're friends 
of Bill's. Bill won't stand for nothin' of this kind in 
his district since he got that bid to Esopus." 

This exhausts the facts concerning the Kali diamond. 
But it is deemed not inconsequent to close with the 
following brief (paid) item that appeared two days 
later in a morning paper. 

"It is rumored that a niece of Gen. Marcellus B. 
Ludlow, of New York City, will appear on the stage 
next season. 

"Her diamonds are said to be extremely valuable 
and of much historic interest." 



XXV 

THE DAY WE CELEBRATE 

IN THE tropics" ("Hop-along" Bibb, the bird 
fancier, was saying to me) "the seasons, months, fort- 
nights, week-ends, holidays, dog-days, Sundays, and 
yesterdays get so jumbled together in the shuffle that 
you never know when a year has gone by until you're 
in the middle of the next one." 

"Hop-along" Bibb kept his bird store on lower 
Fourth Avenue. He was an ex-seaman and beach- 
comber who made regular voyages to southern ports 
and imported personally conducted invoices of talk- 
ing parrots and dialectic paroquets. He had a stiff 
knee, neck, and nerve. I had gone to him to buy 
a parrot to present, at Christmas, to my Aunt 
Joanna. 

"This one," said I, disregarding his homily on the 
subdivisions of time " this one that seems all red, 
white, and blue to what genus of beasts does he 
belong? He appeals at once to my patriotism and 
to my love of discord in colour schemes." 

"That's a cockatoo from Ecuador," said Bibb. "All 
he has been taught to say is "Merry Christmas." A 

275 



276 Sixes and Sevens 

seasonable bird. He's only seven dollars; and I'll 
bet many a human has stuck you for more money by 
making the same speech to you." 

And then Bibb laughed suddenly and loudly. 

"That bird," he explained, "reminds me. He's 
got his dates mixed. He ought to be saying 'E 
pluribus unum,' to match his feathers, instead of trying 
to work the Santa Glaus graft . It reminds me of the 
time me and Liverpool Sam got our ideas of things 
tangled up on the coast of Costa Rica on account of 
the weather and other phenomena to be met with 
in the tropics. 

"We were, as it were, stranded on that section of 
the Spanish main with no money to speak of and no 
friends that should be talked about either. We had 
stoked and second-cooked ourselves down there on a 
fruit steamer from New Orleans to try our luck, 
which was discharged, after we got there, for lack of 
evidence. There was no work suitable to our instincts; 
so me and Liverpool began to subsist on the red rum 
of the country and such fruit as we could reap where 
we had not sown. It was an alluvial town, called 
Soledad, where there was no harbour or future or 
recourse. Between steamers the town slept and drank 
rum. It only woke up when there were bananas 
to ship. It was like a man sleeping through dinner 
until the dessert. 

" Wlien me and Liverpool got so low down that the 



The Day We Celebrate 277 

American consul wouldn't speak to us we knew we'd 
struck bed rock. 

" We boarded with a snuff-brown lady named Chica, 
who kept a rum-shop and a ladies' and gents' restaur- 
ant in a street called the calle de los Forty-seven In- 
consolable Saints. When our credit played out there, 
Liverpool, whose stomach overshadowed his sensations 
of noblesse oblige, married Chica. This kept us in rice 
and fried plantain for a month; and then Chica 
pounded Liverpool one morning sadly and earnestly 
for fifteen minutes with a casserole handed down 
from the stone age, and we knew that we had out- 
welcomed our liver. That night we signed an engage- 
ment with Don Jaime McSpinosa, a hybrid banana 
fancier of the place, to work on his fruit preserves 
nine miles out of town. We had to do it or be 
reduced to sea water and broken doses of feed and 
slumber. 

"Now, speaking of Liverpool Sam, I don't malign 
or inexculpate him to you any more than I would to 
his face. But in my opinion, when an Englishman 
gets as low as he can he's got to dodge so that the dregs 
of other nations don't drop ballast on him out of then* 
balloons. And if he's a Liverpool Englishman, why, 
fire-damp is what he's got to look out for. Being a 
natural American, that's my personal view. But 
Liverpool and me had much in common. We were 
without decorous clothes or ways and means of 



278 Sixes and Sevens 

existence; and, as the saying goes, misery certainly 
does enjoy the society of accomplices. 

"Our job on old McSpinosa's plantation was chop- 
ping down banana stalks and loading the bunches of 
fruit on the backs of horses. Then a native dressed 
up in an alligator hide belt, a machete, and a pair of 
AA sheeting pajamas, drives 'em over to the coast and 
piles 'em up on the beach. 

"You ever been in a banana grove? It's as solemn 
as a rathskeller at seven A. M. It's like being lost be- 
hind the scenes at one of these mushroom musical 
shows. You can't see the sky for the foliage above 
you; and the ground is knee deep in rotten leaves; 
and it's so still that you can hear the stalks growing 
again after you chop 'em down. 

"At night me and Liverpool herded in a lot of grass 
huts on the edge of a lagoon with the red, yellow, and 
black employes of Don Jaime. There we lay fighting 
mosquitoes and listening to the monkeys squalling 
and the alligators grunting and splashing in the lagoon 
until daylight with only snatches of sleep between 
times. 

"We soon lost all idea of what time of the year it 
was. It's just about eighty degrees there in December 
and June and on Fridays and at midnight and election 
day and any other old time. Sometimes it rains more 
than at others, and that's all the difference you notice. 
A man is liable to live along there without noticing 



The Day We Celebrate 279 

any fugiting of tempus until some day the undertaker 
calls in for him just when he's beginning to think about 
cutting out the gang and saving up a little to invest 
in real estate. 

"I don't know how long we worked for Don Jaime; 
but it was through two or three rainy spells, eight or ten 
hair cuts, and the life of three pairs of sail-cloth trousers. 
All the money we earned went for rum and tobacco; 
but we ate, and that was something. 

"All of a sudden one day me and Liverpool find the 
trade of committing surgical operations on banana 
stalks turning to aloes and quinine in our mouths. 
It's a seizure that often comes upon white men in 
Latin and geographical countries. We wanted to be 
addressed again in language and see the smoke of a 
steamer and read the real estate transfers and gents' 
outfitting ads in an old newspaper. Even Soledad 
seemed like a centre of civilization to us, so that 
evening we put our thumbs on our nose at Don 
Jaime's fruit stand and shook his grass burrs off our 
feet. 

"It was only twelve miles to Soledad, but it took 
me and Liverpool two days to get there. It was 
banana grove nearly all the way; and we got twisted 
time and again. It was like paging the palm room of 
a New York hotel for a man named Smith. 

"When we saw the houses of Soledad between the 
trees all my disinclination toward this Liverpool Sam 



280 Sixes and Sevens 

rose up in me. I stood him while we were two white 
men against the banana brindles; but now, when there 
were prospects of my exchanging even cuss words with 
an American citizen, I put him back in his proper 
place. And he was a sight, too, with his rum-painted 
nose and his red whiskers and elephant feet with leather 
sandals strapped to them. I suppose I looked about 
the same. 

"'It looks to me,' says I, 'like Great Britain ought 
to be made to keep such gin-swilling, scurvy, unbecom- 
ing mud larks as you at home instead of sending 'em 
over here to degrade and taint foreign lands. We 
kicked you out of America once and we ought to put 
on rubber boots and do it again.' 

"'Oh, you go to 'ell,' says Liverpool, which was 
about all the repartee he ever had. 

"Well, Soledad, looked fine to me after Don Jaime's 
plantation. Liverpool and me walked into it side by 
side, from force of habit, past the calabosa and the 
Hotel Grande, down across the plaza toward Chica's 
hut, where we hoped that Liverpool, being a husband 
of hers, might work his luck for a meal. 

"As we passed the two-story little frame house 
occupied by the American Club, we noticed that the 
balcony had been decorated all around with wreaths 
of evergreens and flowers, and the flag was flying from 
the pole on the roof. Stanzey, the consul, and Ark- 
right, a gold-mine owner, were smoking on the balcony. 



The Day We Celebrate 281 

Me and Liverpool waved our dirty hands toward 
'em and smiled real society smiles; but they turned 
their backs to us and went on talking. And we had 
played whist once with the two of 'em up to the time 
when Liverpool held all thirteen trumps for four 
hands in succession. It was some holiday, we knew; 
but we didn't know the day nor the year. 

"A little further along we saw a reverend man named 
Pendergast, who had come to Soledad to build a church, 
standing under a cocoanut palm with his little black 
alpaca coat and green umbrella. 

"'Boys, boys!' says he, through his blue spectacles, 
'is it as bad as this? Are you so far reduced?' 

"'We're reduced,' says I, 'to very vulgar fractions.' 

'"It is indeed sad,' says Pendergast, 'to see my 
countrymen hi such circumstances.' 

"'Cut 'arf of that out, old party,' says Liverpool. 
' Cawn't you tell a member of the British upper classes 
when you see one?' 

'"Shut up,' I told Liverpool. 'You're on foreign 
soil now, or that portion of it that's not on you.' 

"'And on this day, too !' goes on Pendergast, 
grievous 'on this most glorious day of the year when 
we should all be celebrating the dawn of Christian 
civilization and the downfall of the wicked/ 

'"I did notice bunting and bouquets decorating 
the town, reverend,' says I, 'but I didn't know what 
it was for. We've been so long out of touch with 



282 Sixes and Sevens 

calendars that we didn't know whether it was summer 
time or Saturday afternoon. 

"'Here is two dollars,' says Pendergast digging up 
two Chili silver wheels and handing 'em to me. 'Go, 
my men, and observe the rest of the day in a befitting 
manner.' 

"Me and Liverpool thanked him kindly, and walked 
away. 

"'Shall we eat?' I asks. 

"'Oh, 'ell!' says Liverpool. 'What's money for?' 

"'Very well, then,' I says, 'since you insist upon it, 
we'll drink.' 

"So we pull up in a rum shop and get a quart of it 
and go down on the beach under a cocoanut tree and 
celebrate. 

"Not having eaten anything but oranges in two 
days, the rum has immediate effect; and once more I 
conjure up great repugnance toward the British 
nation. 

"'Stand up here,' I says to Liverpool, 'you scum 
of a despot limited monarchy, and have another dose 
of Bunker Hill. That good man, Mr. Pendergast,' 
says I, 'said we were to observe the day in a befitting 
manner, and I'm not going to see his money mis- 
applied.' 

"'Oh, you go to 'ell!' says Liverpool, and I started 
in with a fine left-hander on his right eye. 

"Liverpool had been a fighter once, but dissipation 



The Day We Celebrate 283 

and bad company had taken the nerve out of him. 
In ten minutes I had him lying on the sand waving 
the white flag. 

" 'Get up,' says I, kicking him in the ribs, 'and come 
along with me.' 

"Liverpool got up and followed behind me because 
it was his habit, wiping the red off his face and nose. 
I led him to Reverend Pendergast's shack and called 
him out. 

"'Look at this, sir,' says I 'look at this thing 
that was once a proud Britisher. You gave us two 
dollars and told us to celebrate the day. The star- 
spangled banner still waves. Hurrah for the stars 
and eagles!' 

'"Dear me,' says Pendergast, holding up his hands. 
'Fighting on this day of all days! On Christmas 
day, when peace on ' 

'"Christmas, hell!' says I. 'I thought it was the 
Fourth of July.'" 

"Merry Christmas!" said the red, white, and blue 
cockatoo. 

"Take him for six dollars," said Hop-along Bibb. 
"He's got his dates and colours mixed." 




THE COUNTRY LIFE PRESS 
GARDEN CITY N. Y. 









^ 




